ELKHORN, Wis. — Two women whose remains were found stuffed in suitcases dropped along a rural Wisconsin highway may have died accidentally, perhaps during consensual sex, the defense attorney for a former police officer suspected in their deaths said Friday.

Steven Zelich, a 52-year-old security officer, has been charged with two counts of hiding a corpse. A prosecutor convinced a judge to set bond at $1 million, saying he expected homicide charges to be filed in the counties where the women were killed, but Zelich’s attorney said it’s unclear how the women died.

“It could be anything from premeditated homicide down to accidental death that occurred through a consensual sex-related act,” Walworth County public defender Travis Schwantes said after the bond hearing.

Zelich previously was involved in an incident with a prostitute, according to police records, and authorities have said he may have met one of the women in the suitcases on a bondage website.

He was arrested Wednesday, when detectives wearing hazmat suits removed a refrigerator and large brown bags of evidence from his apartment in West Allis, a Milwaukee suburb. He appeared for Friday’s bond hearing through a video from jail but did not speak.