Maine State Police say they believe a body recovered from a shallow grave in Jefferson last week is a man last seen alive in 2002. 

The State Medical Examiner’s Office says the death is a homicide and that more work will take place to establish a positive identification.  

Detectives believe the skeleton remains are those of Charles “Chuck” Woodburn, who was 51 in 2002. 

The body was found in the front yard of his former home at 219 Neck Road in Jefferson. 

Last Wednesday, a team of detectives searched the site and with the help of body dogs from State Police and the Maine Warden Service, pinpointed the gravesite, near a rock wall. 

A backhoe was then used to excavate the site and the body was unearthed. 

At the time of his disappearance, Woodburn was married and living at the house with his wife, Diane Darling. 

Darling later married Robert Gaudette, and died in 2010.  She never reported Woodburn missing, but family members did following her death. 

The cause of death is not being released at this time and detectives are now interviewing family and friends of Woodburn, attempting to retrace his whereabouts before he disappeared.