Lakeview Resident Calls the Complex 'The Jungle'

An elderly woman with a metal, four-legged walker with front wheels, peered around the corner of her apartment unit this week and wondered what was happening.

She saw police and caution tape near a wooded area of the Lakeview Apartments where she lives, but didn't know what was going on. When a reporter told her, she gasped. But then, she said she wasn't surprised.

"It's like a jungle around here," said the woman, who declined to give her name. "It's very dark and there's a lot of trees."

The woman, who has lived here for 14 years, said she generally feels safe and often walks her miniature poodle at 2 or 3 a.m., but she warns new residents to be on the lookout for car thieves.

But there's a much more serious problem now. The activity the woman was watching Monday was police discovering the dead body of Carol Reiff, a Lakeview resident. It took two days to identify her remains, even though she last spoke to relatives on June 20 and was reported missing the following day.

Police canvassed the complex on Thursday and distributed fliers asking residents for information on Reiff's disappearance. Many residents this week said they didn't feel safe anymore at the complex and that crime was a major concern.

"As soon as I heard she was missing, I knew something was wrong," said Danielle Killian, a Lakeview resident as she clutched her young son standing in front of her. "We're too close to (Route) 42, it's too easy here."

Lakeview is located in the 500 block of Lower Landing Road and borders Route 42, the six-lane road also known as the North-South Freeway. Reiff's body was found on Monday morning in a wooded area just off the access road to the highway.

Police haven't ruled Reiff's death a homicide yet, but neighbors fear the worse.

"Nobody should lose their lives like this," said Rich Moulder, 44, an unemployed bread truck driver. "I've been here 12 years and I've never seen anything like this."

Moulder said he thinks he remembers seeing Reiff jogging around the complex. Killian said she's sure she has seen her jogging and in a convenience store in the complex.

"We get a lot of muggings around here, people breaking into cars," said Moses Rivera, who moved his family from Camden to here several years ago. "People just come around here and park and do drugs, have sex in cars. This is not getting better."

Rivera said he's concerned for his family's safety. Then a sobering thought came to mind.

"I hope I don't know her," he said on Monday, before the body was identified.