WESTFORD

Man Admits Dumping Woman's Body in Westford After Overdose in Car

Melissa Mestre's body was discovered down an embankment by a person walking his dog on the road two days after Daniel Perras dumped it, Middlesex County prosecutors said

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A man who'd been charged with dumping a woman's body on a road in Westford, Massachusetts, in 2019 has pleaded guilty, officials said Monday.

Daniel Perras, a 59-year-old from Easthampton, admitted leaving Melissa Mestre's body near a secluded stretch of Providence Road on Jan. 31, 2019, and getting rid of her belongings at a bridge miles away in Western Massachusetts, according to the Middlesex District Attorney's Office.

After pleading guilty in Middlesex Superior Court, Perras was sentenced to seven to eight years in prison for destroying evidence and three years of probation for disposing of the body improperly, prosecutors said.

Mestre's body was discovered down an embankment by a person walking his dog on the road two days after Perras dumped it, prosecutors said. Investigators identified Mestre and Perras, finding that they had recently met and that Perras had driven them from Springfield to Haverhill, where he bought heroin.

Authorities say they are investigating after a woman was found dead by the side of a road in Westford.

On their way back, Perras realized that Mestre had died of a drug overdose, according to prosecutors, and pulled off Interstate 495, drove past a fire station to the place on Providence Road where he stopped and left the woman's body.

He took her purse, cellphone and other belongings, then left disposed of them at a Bridge on Route 2A in Erving, north of Amherst. Prosecutors announced his arrest in October 2019.

At the time, they said Mestre was 38 and from Springfield.

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