A 41-year-old woman wanted on an active Pennsylvania warrant was tracked down in Schenectady, New York, and extradited to Cambria County this week, more than two years after a man's body was found decomposing inside the attic crawl space of a Johnstown home. Angela Rice now sits in Cambria County Prison on $200,000 cash bail, charged with abuse of a corpse in connection with the death of 36-year-old Gregory Ira Rohn.
Rice was located and taken into custody by Johnstown police officers and Cambria County detectives before being brought back to Pennsylvania this month, according to WJAC. She was arraigned Thursday night and is now scheduled for a preliminary hearing on September 10, as first reported by WTAJ.
Rohn was originally reported missing by his mother in December 2023, after she picked him up from Cambria County Jail and dropped him off at a home in Old Conemaugh Borough, according to police criminal complaints cited by FOX8. He had reportedly told his mother he was headed to visit a friend before he vanished. His body wasn't found until June 2024, discovered wrapped in a tarp inside the attic crawl space of a residence on the 100 block of Adams Street, per the same account from FOX8.
Skeletal Remains Made Toxicology Impossible
By the time investigators found him, Rohn's body had decomposed down to skeletal remains, according to WJAC's reporting, and had reportedly deteriorated through the floor of the crawl space. During a July 2024 press conference, Cambria County Coroner Jeff Lees officially identified the remains as Rohn and said that while an overdose was suspected, the severe decomposition made it impossible for toxicology testing to determine exact drug levels. Lees also stressed at the time that Rohn could not have wrapped himself in the tarp in which he was found.
That forensic gap has shaped the entire case. Because toxicology couldn't confirm a cause of death, prosecutors were unable to pursue charges like drug delivery resulting in death or criminal homicide, even though county investigators determined Rohn's death was highly suspicious. Johnstown police instead charged Rice last summer with abuse of a corpse, the only charge currently filed against her.
An Acquaintance's Account Led to Charges
According to a report from a Facebook post cited in court documents, law enforcement filed charges against Rice after an acquaintance told criminal investigators that Rice had confessed Rohn overdosed and that she then hid his body “in the walls” of the Adams Street residence. Rohn had been reported missing for months before his body was ultimately found, and the case sat unresolved through the summer 2025 charging decision until Rice's arrest this month closed the gap between accusation and custody.
Abuse of a corpse under 18 Pa.C.S. § 5510 is defined under Pennsylvania law as treating a dead body in a manner known to outrage ordinary family sensibilities, and it's classified as a second-degree misdemeanor, according to the Pennsylvania General Assembly. That classification caps the maximum penalty at two years in prison and a $5,000 fine, regardless of the fact that a body sat concealed inside a residential structure for months.
A County With One of the State's Highest Overdose Rates
The case unfolds against a grim regional backdrop. Cambria County recorded an age-adjusted drug overdose death rate of 69.6 per 100,000 residents between 2022 and 2024, according to the Pennsylvania Department of Health — nearly double the statewide average of 38.1 per 100,000. County coroners are statutorily required to investigate all sudden, uncertified, or suspicious deaths, including decomposed or unidentified remains suspected of involving drug toxicity, per the Cambria County Government.
Cases like Rohn's have also fueled a broader statewide debate. In response to high-profile cases involving hidden human remains across Pennsylvania, state legislators have discussed statutory revisions that would elevate body concealment and corpse desecration from misdemeanors to felony offenses carrying up to 10 years in prison, according to ACLU Pennsylvania. Under current Pennsylvania law, concealing a corpse remains a misdemeanor unless homicide or child abuse can be proven — a threshold prosecutors in Rohn's case could not meet given the state of his remains.
For now, Rice remains held at Cambria County Prison as she awaits her September 10 preliminary hearing, with no additional charges filed in connection with Rohn's death.
