From the Las Vegas Review - Journal:

"CARSON CITY - The horrible smell is the first thing that hits you when you walk into the ordinary-looking home in a tidy middle-class neighborhood on Mountain Street, about a mile north of the Governor's Mansion.

"That's the odor of death," real estate agent Jeri Vine said.

This is the 1,200-square-foot home where sheriff's deputies in July found the remains of 69-year-old recluse Walter Samaszko Jr. Neighbors had called police to complain about the stench coming for the home. Authorities determined that Samaszko had been dead for more than a month. A hazardous-materials team had to remove the remains. The body had decayed so much that the flooring had to be removed.

Carson City Clerk-Treasurer Alan Glover, who serves as public administrator, then asked Vine whether she would clean up the home, cart belongings to the dump or give them to charities and then sell the home.

On Aug. 1, four days into her cleanup, Vine started rummaging through a huge stack of empty boxes in the garage. She threw many into the trash bin that had been placed in the driveway. Then she found something heavy in boxes marked "Books."

Gold.

Boxes of gold coins and gold bullion.

Gold also later was found in boxes in an old washing machine and in the crawl space in the garage.

After a brief hesitation, Vine called Glover.

"Alan get over here. There is a ton of money here," she recollected saying.

Glover ultimately put the value of the gold they found, the value as determined by its weight, at $7 million. Also found in a safe was $12,000 in cash and $165,000 in stock accounts. He has hired two coin companies to grade the coins for their numismatic value, which might be millions higher. Some coins date to the 1840s.

Glover put the gold into his pickup and hauled it to the courthouse vault. Now it rests in a vault at the Loomis Armed Truck Co., waiting for probate hearings and settlement proceedings.

Samaszko left no will.

It took Glover and three members of his staff two days just to count the gold coins.

"You never would have thought counting gold would become boring, but it did.""