A young woman goes missing and is found murdered 3 miles from home. In the summer of 1977, Lyla Poitras, a 27-year-old Caucasian woman, was looking forward to a two-week vacation to visit her parents in her hometown of Caribou, Maine. Having moved to Tiverton, Rhode Island, in 1972 and since divorced, she lived alone in her house on Cynthia Avenue. Friends described her as an outgoing animal lover who was quick to help any stray in need.
Concerns for Lyla's well-being arose when a neighbor noticed her car hadn't moved for several days.
Peering into a window, the neighbor saw the television on in her bedroom but no sign of Lyla. This unsettling discovery prompted a call to the Tiverton Police Department on June 29, 1977, officially marking the beginning of a missing person investigation. The last person known to have seen Lyla was her boyfriend, who had been with her watching a Red Sox game, leaving her home around midnight on June 27th. Investigators found no signs of a struggle at her residence; her purse, identification, and glasses were all left behind, suggesting she may have left with someone she knew, intending to return shortly.
The search for Lyla came to a grim end on July 13, 1977. State transportation workers, cutting grass along William Canning Boulevard just over three miles from her home, discovered her body in a wooded area near the intersection with Stafford Road. She was fully clothed and had been there for some time. An autopsy would later reveal that Lyla had died from a single gunshot wound to the right side of her head, fired from a small-caliber handgun. There were no signs of a physical or sexual assault, and investigators believed she had been killed elsewhere and her body dragged into the underbrush.
Despite an extensive investigation involving the Tiverton Police, Rhode Island State Police, and the FBI, no arrests have ever been made in connection with Lyla Poitras's murder. Over the years, more than 100 people have been interviewed, and numerous leads have been pursued. Her boyfriend was cleared as a suspect. Decades later, the case remains unsolved, though police have indicated that they do have a person of interest but lack sufficient information to proceed with charges. The community was left to mourn a woman taken in the prime of her life, her killer having never been brought to justice.
