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Watchman found killed at construction company
By JEFFREY S. SOLOCHEK, Times Staff Writer SPRING HILL -- A night watchman at D.A.B. Constructors' Spring Hill plant died Sunday night in a case that Hernando County sheriff's detectives are certain was murder but won't say why. A co-worker found Richard Leo March, 60, of Floral City dead in the middle of the construction yard at 7:26 p.m., shortly after March had arrived for work. He might have encountered trespassers, investigators said, which might be connected to the case. "We're not releasing the cause of death, and we're not releasing (possible) motives," sheriff's spokesman Lt. Joe Paez said Monday afternoon. "We have a number of investigators out interviewing co-workers, friends and colleagues. . . . We have no suspects at this time." Because the homicide took place in the center of the D.A.B. compound, 3300 Northeast Parkway, the Sheriff's Office is treating the entire site as a crime scene, Paez said. He said several footprints and other pieces of evidence were found. Paez said he did not expect an immediate arrest, "unless somebody steps forward and does confess, or we're able to get lucky." The medical examiner did an autopsy Monday, but the Sheriff's Office would not release the results. "He did not die of natural causes," Paez said. March is survived by his mother and two sisters, who live in California. They asked not to be contacted, Paez said, because "at this time of the year they're really traumatized." March lived in a rural Floral City neighborhood near the Hernando/Citrus border, accessible only by a dusty gravel road. His dingy yellow and gray mobile home is shrouded by a thicket of pine trees. Neighbors described him as very private and quiet. "I don't think he ever had any company," said Sue Phillips, who lives in the mobile home next to March's. "I don't remember seeing anybody over at his place." March kept odd hours as a night security guard and didn't socialize much with others in the neighborhood. He had rented the mobile home in Floral City for about three years. Phillips said March used to raise pigeons and loved his Harley Davidson motorcycle, which he bought last year. "Every time I saw him, he was always riding that motorcycle," she said. "He was a very nice man, very polite." March's death was the county's fourth murder of 2001. Earlier this month, the Sheriff's Office arrested Daniel Wingard as a suspect in the stabbing death of Spring Hill resident Michael Altieri. In April, deputies arrested David Brozey as a suspect in the shooting of Spring Hill resident Jesus Sanches. In January, Linda L. Clevinger of Brooksville was shot and killed in what authorities called a "drug deal gone bad." Virgil James Fohl pleaded guilty to the killing on Dec. 17. - Staff writer Carrie Johnson contributed to this report, which includes information from Times files.
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