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WINDSOR – Petitions have been drawn against a local juvenile who is in custody for the death of a Powellsville man in July.

Bertie Sheriff John Holley said an investigation conducted after the body of 56-year-old Christopher Winborne was found July 22 near his home eventually led to the criminal petitions filed against the juvenile.

State law prohibits the release of the name of a person under the age of 18 who is criminally charged. However, their age and gender can be revealed. In this particular case, the juvenile is a 15-year-old male.

Holley said Winborne’s lifeless body was found in a ditch at his residence on Center Grove Road. The body, the Sheriff said, was badly decomposed, which prevented an immediate assessment of the cause of death.

“We have since learned that the death was caused by blunt force trauma,” Holley said on Thursday of this week.

At the outset of the investigation, Holley said that Winborne lived at the residence with a female acquaintance along with several other individuals.

“We were told that Mr. Winborne left his residence in his truck on July 19,” Holley said during an interview back in July. “We don’t believe that’s the case. We believe that the body had been there for at least one week before it was reported to us.”

Holley added this week that the medical examiner’s report showed that the body was in the ditch three to four days before it was discovered.

The North Carolina SBI assisted the Bertie Sheriff’s Office with the investigation.