Upon death the game still thinks the player is still at the location/chunk of death, even though the player has not respawned yet. Usually the tick timer of the items start once a player is in the same Chunk , after 5 mins the items despawn which is understandable, But even though the player has not respawned or showed up at the chunk  the timer still goes off when the player has not respawned or showed up at the chunk yet. An annoying bug especially for Players who go AFK here there because they're multitasking.