As March 4, 1987 was drawing to a close, LaDonna Cooper was no doubt in a rush to get home to her family after putting in her shift as assistant manager of the Bonanza Restaurant in Marion.
A young wife and mother of three, Cooper used the restaurant’s phone at 11:45 p.m. to call her husband to let him know she was running late and would be home as soon as she made a bank deposit.
When she wasn’t home by 12:15 a.m., her concerned husband began calling the restaurant. His alarm only grew a few minutes later when he drove to the restaurant near Interstate 57 and found an empty parking lot and no sign of his wife.
Marion police quickly opened a missing person’s case and began a search for the 31-year-old woman.
Her abandoned car was later located on Sixth Street in Herrin, and a day after that, her body was discovered in a marsh area just west of the observation tower on Illinois 148 in the Crab Orchard Wildlife Refuge.
LaDonna Cooper died as a result of stab wounds. The person, or persons, responsible for inflicting those wounds has not yet been held accountable.
...partial article wrote by Becky Malkovich of The Southern Illinoisan, published March 4, 2012. As of 2021 this case is still cold.
A young wife and mother of three, Cooper used the restaurant’s phone at 11:45 p.m. to call her husband to let him know she was running late and would be home as soon as she made a bank deposit.
When she wasn’t home by 12:15 a.m., her concerned husband began calling the restaurant. His alarm only grew a few minutes later when he drove to the restaurant near Interstate 57 and found an empty parking lot and no sign of his wife.
Marion police quickly opened a missing person’s case and began a search for the 31-year-old woman.
Her abandoned car was later located on Sixth Street in Herrin, and a day after that, her body was discovered in a marsh area just west of the observation tower on Illinois 148 in the Crab Orchard Wildlife Refuge.
LaDonna Cooper died as a result of stab wounds. The person, or persons, responsible for inflicting those wounds has not yet been held accountable.
...partial article wrote by Becky Malkovich of The Southern Illinoisan, published March 4, 2012. As of 2021 this case is still cold.
As March 4, 1987 was drawing to a close, LaDonna Cooper was no doubt in a rush to get home to her family after putting in her shift as assistant manager of the Bonanza Restaurant in Marion.
A young wife and mother of three, Cooper used the restaurant’s phone at 11:45 p.m. to call her husband to let him know she was running late and would be home as soon as she made a bank deposit.
When she wasn’t home by 12:15 a.m., her concerned husband began calling the restaurant. His alarm only grew a few minutes later when he drove to the restaurant near Interstate 57 and found an empty parking lot and no sign of his wife.
Marion police quickly opened a missing person’s case and began a search for the 31-year-old woman.
Her abandoned car was later located on Sixth Street in Herrin, and a day after that, her body was discovered in a marsh area just west of the observation tower on Illinois 148 in the Crab Orchard Wildlife Refuge.
LaDonna Cooper died as a result of stab wounds. The person, or persons, responsible for inflicting those wounds has not yet been held accountable.
...partial article wrote by Becky Malkovich of The Southern Illinoisan, published March 4, 2012. As of 2021 this case is still cold.
A young wife and mother of three, Cooper used the restaurant’s phone at 11:45 p.m. to call her husband to let him know she was running late and would be home as soon as she made a bank deposit.
When she wasn’t home by 12:15 a.m., her concerned husband began calling the restaurant. His alarm only grew a few minutes later when he drove to the restaurant near Interstate 57 and found an empty parking lot and no sign of his wife.
Marion police quickly opened a missing person’s case and began a search for the 31-year-old woman.
Her abandoned car was later located on Sixth Street in Herrin, and a day after that, her body was discovered in a marsh area just west of the observation tower on Illinois 148 in the Crab Orchard Wildlife Refuge.
LaDonna Cooper died as a result of stab wounds. The person, or persons, responsible for inflicting those wounds has not yet been held accountable.
...partial article wrote by Becky Malkovich of The Southern Illinoisan, published March 4, 2012. As of 2021 this case is still cold.
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