Woman found murdered in a ditch after being held captive JoAnn Bontjes, 21, female, White, was a young beautician and salon owner in Sherburn, Minnesota. On October 2, 1975, her car was found abandoned along Highway 4 in Martin County; the next morning a passerby discovered her body in a roadside ditch. Authorities determined she died from a gunshot wound. In reporting over the years, friends and local stylists recalled that other beauticians received suggestive calls from a male voice in the days around her disappearance, a haunting detail that fed
worries she had been targeted after a routine night out. One account notes she had been socializing at the American Legion in nearby Trimont shortly before she vanished, a slice of small-town life cut short on a quiet rural road.
Investigators found her vehicle unattended the day before her body was discovered, but the trail quickly cooled. Rumors long swirled that she might have been pulled over by someone impersonating, or belonging to, law enforcement, a theory fueled by talk of tire tracks and the position of her car, though officials have never substantiated those claims. Decades later, it remains the only unsolved homicide in Martin County, a case that has drawn the dedication of retired and current officers as well as local residents determined to keep her story from fading.
Nearly fifty years on, new forensic attention has offered a glimmer of movement. In April 2024, the Martin County Sheriff’s Office said an unknown DNA sample from the scene had been identified and submitted to the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension for analysis. Even with that development, investigators have announced no arrests, and no suspect has been publicly named. The case remains open, with authorities urging anyone who knows what happened on that autumn night to come forward.
