Pizza box near container with Gwinnett woman’s body got man caught for murder

More than four years after a missing Gwinnett woman’s body was found in a container near a construction site, a man has been convicted of her murder.

James Lee Griffin Jr., 60, was found guilty of felony murder, malice murder, aggravated assault and concealing the death of another in the June 2020 murder of 39-year-old Kathleen Bass.

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In July 2020, a construction worker said he smelled a foul order near the construction site and noticed an upside-down blue container. He used a piece of machinery to pick it up and Bass’ remains fell out of it wrapped up in sheets.

A bag of trash next to the container had a pizza box with a receipt still inside. The receipt listed Griffin’s name and an apartment complex in DeKalb County, just a mile from where Bass’ body was found.

When they searched his apartment, they found a large amount of blood that someone had tried cleaning up. Investigators determined she had been stabbed.

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A friend testified that she dropped Bass off at Griffin’s apartment and never heard from her again.

Ring doorbell camera footage showed Griffin leaving his apartment a few days later dragging a blue container down the stairs.

Griffin moved to Arkansas after the murder and started a job driving a truck. He was arrested when he returned to DeKalb County in September 2020 to check in with a bonding agency on an unrelated matter.

A date has not yet been set for sentencing.

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