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DETROIT — A volunteer made a macabre discovery while helping to clean a 70-parcel area in Detroit as part of a Hantz Farms cleanup event Wednesday morning.

It was about 11 a.m. when Hantz Farms President Mike Score said he was called over by a woman; she'd found a skull.

"I went over and looked and it looked like a real human skull," said Score. "It didn't look like it was fabrication."

About 40 workers from Carhartt clothing company, as well as 10 other employees from DeBuck Construction and Hantz Farms, spent most of Wednesday removing weeds, garbage, trash bags, household items and about 400 tires from land Hantz Farms hopes to purchase from the city for the purpose of planting timber trees.

Score said police arrived on scene within 10 minutes, followed by Wayne County Medical Examiner's Office personnel, and continued to investigate in the area of Louis and Holcomb located in southeast Detroit south of Mack as of 1:30 p.m.

Detroit City Council in December authorized the sale of 170 acres to Hantz Farms. The company plans to plant 70,000 timber trees. In exchange, the city will unload scores of blighted properties that are generating no tax revenue and that it cannot afford to maintain.

So far, Score said the company owns about 165 parcels, nearly 15 acres. The focus of Wednesday's cleanup was a portion of other land Hantz Farms intends to buy.