On a September morning in 1977, the two young children of Linda June Hamilton awoke to a scene of unimaginable horror. Their father, David A. Hamilton, lay dead on the kitchen floor of their Beaver Township, Ohio home, the victim of three gunshots. Their 28-year-old white mother, Linda, was nowhere to be found. The couple's car was also missing from the residence. This grim discovery marked the beginning of a long and complex investigation into Linda's disappearance and presumed death.
Initially, law enforcement considered Linda a suspect in her husband's murder, and a warrant was issued for her arrest. The couple's missing vehicle was located near the entrance of a closed strip mine, not far from the truck stop where Linda worked. Investigators found a telling set of tracks leading away from the car: a man's boot prints alongside a woman's bare footprints. At times, the woman's prints appeared as if she were being dragged. Despite this evidence, the case grew cold, and for years, the fate of Linda June Hamilton remained a mystery.
The first significant break in the case came in 2007 when serial killer Edward A. Surratt, already incarcerated in Florida for other crimes, confessed to the murders of both Linda and David Hamilton. Surratt, a truck driver, was a suspect in at least eighteen other murders. In his confession, he provided details that only the killer would know. He admitted to stealing a bicycle from a nearby home, riding it to the Hamilton residence, and then shooting David. He then abducted Linda from the home. As part of his confession, Surratt stated that Linda's body was 'unrecoverable by anybody's standards.' In exchange for his confession to the Hamilton murders and others, Surratt sought a transfer to a prison in South Carolina, a request that was not granted. Though he has confessed, he has not been formally charged in the Hamilton case. Linda June Hamilton's body has never been found.
