Fri, 02/22/2019 - 7:45pm

Sheriff’s deputies conduct interviews in a yard in front of 20 South Shore Drive, Thursday afternoon. (Photo by Sarah Thompson)

UPDATED: OWLS HEAD (Feb. 22) A South Thomaston woman was arrested Friday afternoon, Feb. 22, by Maine State Police and charged in connection with the death of an elderly Owls Head woman, Thursday, Feb. 21.

Sarah Richards, 37, was charged with murder at approximately 3 p.m. at the Knox County Sheriff's Office in Rockland, where she had been questioned, according to Stephen McCausland, Maine Public Safety spokesman in a news release.

Richards is charged with the death of 83-year-old Helen Carver, who was found dead inside her Owls Head home Thursday afternoon. An autopsy completed today by the State Medical Examiner's Office determined Carver died from "blunt force trauma."

The two women knew each other as Richards had been hired by Carver to shovel her walkway and driveway during the winter, according to the news release

Richards is being held at the Knox County Jail in Rockland. She will likely make her first court appearance Monday afternoon, Feb. 25, at the Knox County Courthouse.

State Police and the Knox County Sheriff’s Office continue to investigate the death of an elderly woman found dead inside her Owls Head home Thursday, Feb. 21.

An autopsy on the body of Helen Carver, 83, began this morning at the State Medical Examiner’s Office in Augusta. Carver’s body was found in her home at 20 South Shore Drive, Thursday afternoon by a relative who had gone to the home to check on her. Carver lived alone.

The relative called Knox County Communications Center at 1:19 p.m. Dispatchers then sent Rockland EMS and Owls Head firefighters to the house for what was known at the time to be an unresponsive person. Once on scene, responders, along with a sheriff’s deputy, confirmed the death.

More Knox Deputies responded to the house, and were later joined by State Police detectives, as the two agencies continue to investigate the circumstances of her death.