The de­com­pos­ing body of a sol­dier as­signed to the Trinidad and To­ba­go De­fence Force Re­serves was found at his Are­na Road, San Raphael home on Thurs­day.

Po­lice said Arnold Roach, 52, who suf­fered from asth­ma, high blood pres­sure and oth­er ail­ments over a pe­ri­od, is be­lieved to have died from nat­ur­al caus­es.

Roach was last sta­tioned at the De­fence Force’s Mac­queripe, Ch­aguara­mas base.

Po­lice said at about 3 pm, a friend of his went to his home and on ar­rival got a foul stench em­a­nat­ing from with­in and saw a lot of flies. He looked through an open win­dow and saw Roach’s de­com­pos­ing body on the floor of the liv­ing room.

Roach’s broth­er Neil, 54, told po­lice he last saw his broth­er alive at about 11 am last Sun­day.

An au­top­sy is ex­pect­ed to be con­duct­ed at the Foren­sics Sci­ence Cen­tre, St James, to de­ter­mine the ac­tu­al cause of death.

Pre­lim­i­nary en­quiries re­vealed no signs of a strug­gle or foul play.

In­ves­ti­ga­tions are con­tin­u­ing.