Homeless Man Sprayed With Paint Found Dead Days Later

A homeless man was spray-painted by a heartless bully. His body was found days after the attack.

A video emerged last week of Michael, whose age is not known, having been sprayed with red paint near to a Tesco convenience store in Middlesborough. The eight-second clip was uploaded to Facebook where a man says “this is how we deal with the beggars on the street,” claiming “he’s not even a beggar.” Chillingly he adds: “There he is, sprayed to death.” The clip has now been taken down.

Aaron Jones, the man who filmed the incident and posted it to Facebook, has insisted he is not to blame after the victim was later found dead. Mr Jones was confronted outside his home where he apologised for posting the video and called for police protection for himself. He claims he had approached homeless Michael and filmed the moment he was covered in red paint while sitting outside a supermarket.

“I’m not responsible for his murder. I now need police protection. I posted the video and I’m sorry for that, and I feel for the lad’s family. But I wasn’t responsible for spraying him with paint – I just came out of the shop and took a video.” When asked if he felt responsible for the death, he replied: “No I don’t.” Police have said they are not linking the filming incident to the death of Michel on Wednesday and say it is ‘not suspicious.’

But it is not the first time that Jones has pictured Michael. On August 31st, he posted an image of him sitting in the same spot outside the supermarket saying: “About time this spice head got removed from back of Tesco, smile for the camera.” The photograph was accompanied with two laughing emojis. Michael’s friend Jesse Rose told Metro.co.uk: “Michael was a great person who didn’t have one bad bone in his body, he was kind and would always be respectful whenever someone would turn him down when he asked for change. I’d only really known Michael from around February time but he soon came to be, what I considered, a very good friend to me – he always knew when I wasn’t myself and knew the right things to say.”

“He’d always go to me afterwards ‘See, I’ve got you to smile like I always do’ and he was right, he never failed. I just wish he knew how many people thought highly of him and how much he is missed by a lot of people.”

Ms Rose said she did not know many details about how Michael became homeless but it was linked to the death of his mum. She added: “I believe he is with her now, and that she’s rescued him from this cruel cold world, but I’d do anything to have him back so I could sit and chat with him just one last time.” Yesterday a retired couple stopped at the supermarket scene to look at the flowers. The woman said: “You used to see him in the summer, he used to sit out here with his shirt off getting a sun tan.”

Flowers and cards have been left at the cemetery as well as at the spot where Michael apparently used to sit. Spray paint can still be seen on the wall. People have taken to social media to pay tribute to him and express their sadness at the news. One said: “So sad. What a life. RIP young man. What a cruel world we live in.” Another wrote: “Such a polite young lad going through a hard time and now this. So sad. RIP.”

A Cleveland police spokeswoman said: “Police were called to Eston Cemetery on Normanby Road shortly after 2.50pm on Wednesday. Sadly on arrival, the body of a man was found at the scene. The death is currently being treated as unexplained whilst enquires continue. If anyone has further information please contact Cleveland Police via the 101 number quoting event 166668.”

Police said no arrests have been made in relation to the alleged spray-painting incident.