Skeletal remains found near Albany cemetery could be part of skeleton found a month ago

ALBANY — Landon Roberts spent his Sunday on his hands and knees digging through brush, finding skeletal remains he believes to be his father’s at the periphery of Crown Hill Cemetery in Albany.

Roberts is the 16-year-old son of 46-year-old Joey Roberts, who went missing in 2020 after being released from the Lee County Jail. A person walking in the wooded area beside the cemetery discovered Joey’s remains on Oct. 1. They were identified about a month later.

Landon Roberts was 13 when his father went missing, and after three years of questions regarding the disappearance, he said he didn’t expect to find answers.

“It was something that had consistently weighed on me to the point that I got used to it,” Landon Roberts said. “I never would have imagined that I would be on my own hands and knees searching for my own father’s remains.”

Family and friends came back to the site after hearing the bones belonged to Joey in search of further closure. The family still does not know how Joey Roberts died.

After the initial discovery they began to find more skeletal remains. The family worked with Missing in Southwest Georgia, a community organization that helps families of missing people.

With the help of a trained canine, they found more skeletal remains and notified Dougherty County Coroner Michael Fowler about their discovery.

Fowler said the coroner’s office went out Monday and collected the bones that were found Sunday, taking photos of where they were found. Now, they are working to determine whether the remains belong to Joey Roberts.

Fowler’s office is also working to determine cause of death and whether foul play was involved, he said.

The bones are small, apparently rib and finger bones, Fowler said. The next step will be sending the bones to a Georgia Bureau of Investigation crime laboratory and then to anthropology experts to see if they match up with the remains that have already been identified.

“Based on what we’ve seen so far, they could possibly be his,” the coroner said.

This case is unusual both because of the location where the bones were found as well as the fact that the bones were seemingly lying on top of the ground, Fowler said.

“After three years, debris and leaves should have been all over, covered them up, but a lot of them were just laid out,” he said. “We’re trying to determine (whether he) was put here. It’s suspicious already.”

After Joey Roberts was released from jail, a friend reported dropping him off in the vicinity of the cemetery and that was the last location where he was seen alive.

The Coroner’s office collected all of the bones from the area, Fowler said. He explained to the family that animals potentially could have carried others away from the site.

Fowler couldn’t confirm how long the investigation would take. The crime lab is already backed up, he said.

Now, while the family waits for answers, they are also coming to terms with the discovery and memories of their loved one.

Bailey Gilchrist, Joey’s 23-year-old step-daughter, said the last few years and especially the last few days have been traumatic.

“Just constantly wondering in the back of your head what happened and whether we will have any answers,” she said. “We’re just trying to hang in there really.”

Landon Roberts’ father struggled with addiction after suffering a work-related back injury.

Joey was a great father, funny, lighthearted and charismatic, his son said.

“He’s like the type of parent that tells you ‘don’t tell your mom this,’ because we’ll go over a speed bump at 15 miles per hour and catch a little bit of air and laugh about it,” he said.

He was still the same person he was before — a family man, he said.

He wants people to know that no one struggling with addiction should be shamed. They need comfort, Landon Roberts said.

The family is looking forward to getting closure and hopes their story will help other families of missing people as well.

“It’s never going to be easy, but all people go through hard things at some point in their life,” Landon Roberts said. “I would rather go through it young so I can gain that wisdom to overcome such a challenge.”