Marie Lisa Peak, a courageous and aspiring 19-year-old journalism student, was on the cusp of her sophomore year at Wartburg College in Waverly, Iowa. Known to her friends and family as Lisa, she was the daughter of Dr. Frank Peak, a respected veterinarian and former city councilman in her hometown of Knoxville, and his wife, Mary. Lisa had returned to the college campus on Sunday, September 5, 1976, ready for classes to begin.
But the promising young student would not live to see her second year of college.
On the afternoon of Labor Day, September 6, Lisa told her friends in the dorm that she was walking to the nearby Willow Lawn Shopping Center to buy some school supplies. She had a date scheduled for later that evening and was expected to return. When she failed to come back to her dorm, her worried friends reported her missing. The search for Lisa ended in tragedy the following morning, Tuesday, September 7. A farmer, John Anhalt, discovered her nude body lying face down in a ditch under a lone cottonwood tree on a gravel road just north of Waverly's city limits. The area was known locally as a lovers' lane.
An autopsy revealed the brutal nature of her death; Marie Lisa Peak had been sexually assaulted, and her life was taken by suffocation and a broken neck. Her clothing and personal belongings were never found at the scene. The investigation that followed was extensive, with authorities questioning over 200 students at Wartburg College, but no arrests were ever made. Her murder sent a shockwave through the small Iowa town, not just because of its brutality, but because it was the third in a string of similar unsolved killings of young women in the area.
Lisa's death became linked to two other unsolved murders, collectively known as the "Waverly Stranglings" or "The Waverly Three." The victims, all found in rural areas near Waverly, were killed in a similar manner. The first was 14-year-old Valerie Lynn Klossowsky, who was found strangled in June 1971. The second was 18-year-old Julie Ann Benning, who disappeared in November 1975; her body was discovered in a culvert in March 1976, also a victim of strangulation. The pattern of young women being strangled and left in remote locations led many to believe a serial killer was responsible.
A significant aspect of Lisa's story is the immense bravery she had shown in the months leading up to her murder. She had been instrumental in dismantling a dangerous sex and extortion ring run by a used car salesman named John Joseph Carmody, Jr. Carmody had blackmailed and assaulted numerous women, and Lisa's testimony was key to his conviction in May 1976, which resulted in a 40-year prison sentence. Lisa and a reporter, Chuck Offenburger, were even planning to write a book about the ordeal. While Carmody was incarcerated at the time of Lisa's murder, investigators considered whether her death was an act of retaliation connected to the case, though they eventually came to believe her killer was likely someone else.
Years turned into decades without answers for the Peak family. In May 2010, in a renewed effort to solve the cold case, authorities exhumed Lisa's body with the hope that advancements in DNA technology could finally identify her killer. Unfortunately, the condition of her remains after so many years prevented the recovery of any usable DNA evidence. Lisa's parents, Frank and Mary Peak, passed away in 2013 and 2014, respectively, without ever seeing justice for their daughter. The murder of Marie Lisa Peak, along with those of Valerie Klossowsky and Julie Benning, remains an unsolved case that continues to haunt the community of Waverly.
