Police say Jordan Scales was found dead April 19 in a wooded area near South Federal Highway, and no arrest had been announced by Wednesday.
BOYNTON BEACH, Fla. — Jordan Scales, a 29-year-old Ohio man who had recently moved to South Florida, was found dead in a wooded area near South Federal Highway on Sunday morning, and Boynton Beach police are investigating his death as a homicide.
The case has drawn attention for both what investigators have said and what they have not. Police have identified Scales, given the place where his body was found and said they believe he was killed sometime between April 16 and April 19. Beyond that, they have not publicly described how he died, whether a suspect has been identified or what evidence has emerged from the scene. At the same time, family members in Ohio have been speaking publicly about the man they knew, saying the first official descriptions of Scales captured too little of his life and too much of his hardship.
Police said officers were called around 7 a.m. Sunday, April 19, after a report of a dead body in a wooded area near the 1900 block of South Federal Highway. When they arrived, they found Scales dead near the brushy stretch of land close to Harvey E. Oyer Jr. Park. Detectives later said the case was being handled as a homicide and that the killing likely happened sometime during the three days before his body was discovered. By Wednesday, no arrest had been announced, no charging document had surfaced and no public court filing had laid out a theory of the case. That left the early timeline unusually tight but still incomplete: a body found at daybreak, a possible killing window stretching back to Thursday, and a public investigation still in its first stage.
Boynton Beach police have released only a narrow set of details. Officers said Scales was 29 and described him in early reporting as a local transient or someone temporarily living in the area. Detectives asked anyone with information to contact Detective Leitner, but they did not say what led them to classify the case as a homicide, whether there were visible signs of trauma, whether surveillance video had been recovered or whether any witness had reported seeing Scales in the area before his death. Police also had not publicly identified any persons of interest by Wednesday or said whether investigators believe the killing was random, targeted or connected to someone Scales knew. In practical terms, that means the public record remains thin even as detectives likely work through witness interviews, forensic evidence, phone records and the autopsy process behind the scenes.
For Scales’ relatives, the sparse official record has been painful partly because they say it leaves out the fuller story of who he was. His sister, Hilary Lee, told WPBF that her brother was “one of a kind” and brought energy that stood out wherever he went. She said he grew up in Ohio in a family that spent much of its time outdoors, often around fishing, boats and the water. His brother, David Scales II, told CBS12 that Jordan was not only a homicide victim but also a son, a father, a brother and “an amazing fisherman.” Family members said he won a local bass fishing tournament at Indian Lake, Ohio, and that his skill on the water stayed part of how they remembered him. They described him as the youngest of three siblings, an uncle who was deeply loved and a man whose life mattered even when it did not look settled from the outside.
Relatives also said Scales had struggled and did not want that fact erased. Lee said he had moved around, spending time in places including Tennessee and Kentucky before heading to Florida about two years ago. She described him as a free spirit who could be difficult to pin down, someone who kept searching for where he fit and how to steady his life. Family members said that struggle included instability and addiction, but they said it should not define the way he is remembered after death. Their frustration sharpened after police used the term transient in early accounts of the case. Lee and other relatives have said that wording flattened his life into a label and encouraged strangers online to judge him by his hardest years instead of by the people who loved him and the efforts he was still making. Their public comments have turned the case into more than a homicide report. It is also, in part, a fight over language, dignity and memory.
That tension is common in the first days of violent death investigations, when law enforcement agencies tend to release basic identifying details while withholding information that could affect witness interviews or the integrity of the case. In Scales’ case, the public does know several important facts: the date his body was found, the general location, his age and name, and the detectives’ belief that the killing happened sometime between April 16 and April 19. But many of the usual questions remain unanswered in public view. It is not known where Scales was last seen alive, whether he had been staying near the area where he was found, whether anyone heard or saw suspicious activity in the days before Sunday morning, or whether investigators have connected him to a vehicle, a phone trail or a specific set of contacts during the likely window of death. Until police release more, those gaps leave both the family and the wider public with a case defined as much by silence as by confirmed fact.
The next steps are likely to be procedural before they become public. Detectives typically work homicide cases by narrowing the victim’s last confirmed movements, rechecking who was with him, collecting digital records and awaiting medical findings that can help establish cause and manner of death with greater precision. As of Wednesday, Boynton Beach police had not announced a news conference, a suspect interview, an arrest affidavit or a date for any court appearance tied to the case. No prosecutor had publicly outlined charges because none had been filed. That leaves the next clear milestone uncertain. It could come through an arrest, a public police update, or additional information from the medical examiner that explains how Scales died. Until then, the formal side of the case appears to be in the quiet evidence-gathering stage that often follows the first public alert.
What has been loud, by contrast, is the family’s grief. Lee said the family got the news while on the way to another funeral, a detail that underscored how abruptly the killing shattered an already hard moment. She said her brother loved the outdoors because that was where he felt peace. David Scales II said Jordan should not be reduced to a single police label or a brief headline and that his better traits belonged in the story too. Another relative told local television that “he had a family that loved him,” a short sentence that captured the point the family has kept returning to since Sunday. In the absence of an arrest or a public explanation from detectives, those voices have supplied much of the human detail now attached to the case: a fisherman, a father, a restless younger brother and a man whose life, however uneven, was larger than the circumstances in which it ended.
As of Wednesday, Jordan Scales’ killing remained unsolved, with Boynton Beach detectives publicly holding to the same three-day timeline they first released after his body was found. The next meaningful update is expected to come when police announce an arrest, identify a suspect or release new findings that explain how he was killed.
Author note: Last updated April 22, 2026.