The bodies of two Ohio women and an 11-year-old boy were not intact when they were found in the base of a hollow tree, a family friend said Saturday.

Joe Pejsa, 45, said investigators told him the bodies were found inside the tree along with the remains of the family dog. Authorities have not released a cause of death; preliminary autopsy findings were expected to be released Saturday afternoon.

The bodies of Tina Herrmann, her son Kody Maynard and her friend Stephanie Sprang were found in a wildlife preserve in central Ohio on Thursday, a week after they disappeared from Herrmann's blood-spattered home.

Pejsa, the uncle of Herrmann's former live-in boyfriend, said the family believed someone was watching them before they were killed. He described a man in camouflage sitting on a stump across the street several months before the slayings.

Matthew Hoffman, an unemployed tree-trimmer, is accused of kidnapping the girl and keeping her for nearly four days in the basement of his home in Mount Vernon, about 10 miles west of Howard.

Hoffman gave information that led investigators to the bodies of the others, Knox County Sheriff David Barber said, and he is the only suspect in the killings. His attorney has declined to comment.

Baker has said all three were killed in Herrmann's home in Howard, about 40 miles northeast of Columbus, though he did not say how.

It's not clear how someone managed to put the bodies inside the tree, which has since been cut down. Gary Ludwig, a supervisor with Ohio's Division of Wildlife, described it as an American beech, about 60 feet tall. Beech tree trunks are typically hollowed out, he said.

Authorities have not said why the four were targeted. The sheriff has suggested that Hoffman, who spent six years in a Colorado prison on arson and other charges, had been watching them for some time.

In Mount Vernon, where just about everyone has some small connection to the killings, the grieving process has begun.

Sprang's son Michael Kupiec told WBNS-TV that he has no hatred and is eagerly waiting for investigators to tell his family about what happened to his mother.

"Until we find out more, on if they knew him _ if he knew them, we don't really know anything," Kupiec said.