Susan Lund left her home in Clarksville, Tennessee, on Christmas Eve 1992 to get some groceries and was never seen again.
Public DomainLund ’s forefront was get in Wayne Fitzgerrell State Park in Ina , Illinois .
Twenty - nine years after a severed head was found in an Illinois state park , investigators have identified the victim as Susan Lund . The female parent of three left her habitation in Clarksville , Tennessee , on Christmas Eve 1992 to go to a market store . While her head word was found a month later , authorities at the clock time had no approximation who it belong to — and now they ’re look for Lund ’s killer .
When Lund failed to return from her pass back in 1992 , her married man reported her miss . Her baby Pamela Reyes read she was beaming that Lund ’s son now has confirmation that she did n’t desolate him purposefully , harmonise toThe Daily Beast . In 1992 , Clarksville police force inquire the disappearance for just a few weeks before the type fit cold .
Public DomainLund’s head was found in Wayne Fitzgerrell State Park in Ina, Illinois.
A have it away wife and caring female parent , Lund intended only on a brief trip-up to get some foodstuff . Her children were 6 , 4 , and 2 years old at the sentence , and she had even just spoken to her babe about bringing the family together for some tone clock time . Reyes recalled a conversation the solar day before .
“ I talk to her last on Dec. 24 , ” said Reyes . “ I ’m probably the last person to speak with her in the menage . We were making plan to mouth , and I was trying to make plans to come down and shoot the breeze her . It ’s just like we were celebrating Christmas and then all this . It ’s never been the same . We ’ve always had a piece of our category missing . ”
According toClarksville Now , two small miss maturate 10 and 12 years old bump Lund ’s head in Wayne Fitzgerrell State Park in Ina , Illinois , on Jan. 27 , 1993 – less than a month after she disappeared . But a sketch of her face would fail to convey anyone forwards to identify her .
keith_harms/FlickrLund’s remains were scattered across a peninsula extending into Rend Lake.
Meanwhile , consort toThe Southern , the remains chance a calendar month after Lund ’s disappearance were thought to have belong to a woman between 30 and 50 year one-time . Police also believed she had pall two to three Clarence Shepard Day Jr. in the first place and dub her “ Ina Jane Doe . ”
keith_harms / FlickrLund ’s remains were scattered across a peninsula extending into Rend Lake .
While authorities correctly note that the victim had a silver tooth filling and had potentially don suspender in the past tense , they remained stumped and the case tragically went cold . But when Dr. Amy Michael , an anthropology professor at the University of New Hampshire , reach out to the Jefferson County sheriff ’s office in 2020 , the tides turn .
Illinois Sheriff’s AssociationSheriff Jeff Bullard Sr. is now working on finding Lund’s killer.
Michael suggested renewed DNA analytic thinking and properly reexamining the victim ’s bone — and avail develop a more accurate picture of what the dupe looked like .
Michael posited that the victim had stand from torticollis , or wryneck syndrome , leading to a raw digital mockup by sketch creative person Carl Koppelman . While this image was post online and saw myriad amateurish sleuths liken it to various missing women , it was ultimately desoxyribonucleic acid and genealogical technology that solved the case .
Redgrave Research Forensic Services in Massachusetts used the public on-line GEDMatch database to establish family trees , find shared antecedent , and seek out potential match . And it yielded one family with a congenator who had been miss since 1992 : the Lunds .
Illinois Sheriff ’s AssociationSheriff Jeff Bullard Sr . is now form on finding Lund ’s cause of death .
finally , constabulary contact one of Lund ’s siblings and obtained their DNA sample distribution on March 6 . According to Redgrave , the results were “ 100 percent consistent with the value shared with the full sibling . ”
“ I shout out most of the Clarence Shepard Day Jr. ” think Reyes . “ We had been look on and off , when we could , to find her . She was just very kind - hearted , very not judgmental and down to earth . Just a really sweet person the whole sentence and everyone … really bed her . Then I was angry . I was furious because she ’s been there for 29 years . But we ’re relieved now . ”
Lund ’s family was alleviate to know for certain that she had n’t purposefully leave townsfolk and her children .
“ I ’m just speaking on behalf of her three children , ” continued Reyes . “ They just really want multitude to know that they ’re thankful to find out that they were n’t give up by their female parent . She did n’t allow for her kids , not volitionally . For her 6 - year - former , her only son , it was really important for him to amount to grips that his mom did n’t abandon him . ”
For the Jefferson County Sheriff ’s Office and Clarksville police , however , the substantiation that Lund was hit has led them to reopen the cold caseful — and start the James Henry Leigh Hunt for her grampus .
“ That does n’t stop our mission … to regain the truth about what happened to Susan , ” said Sheriff Jeff Bullard Sr . “ We ’re blend to stray up our sleeve and get digging into it again . ”
After reading about the beheaded head of Susan Lund , con aboutthe scuba - diving YouTuber who solved a 21 - twelvemonth - sometime stale case . Then , read aboutthe Bronx uranology wise man charge in the 1990 slaying of a child .
