OKLAHOMA COLD CASE: WHO KILLED LAURA LONG???

 On July 10, 1977, a nude female body was found on a country road off of State Highway 66, in a ditch near Claremore, Oklahoma.  The body was completely nude and was later identified as 18 year old Laura Long.  The body was identified from her dental records.  She had been missing for 10 days.  Her body had been stripped naked and sexually assaulted.  The Medical Examiner determined the cause of death to be suffocation......  

On a Sunday afternoon in July of 1977 Laura left her home in the evening to go to town and get gas in her car.  She never returned home.  Her mother Pat Long, became very concerned, when she never came home.  The authorities found her car parked in the Ne-Mar Shopping Center on West Will Rogers Blvd.  This street is considered main street.  The young people dragged main and then parked in the parking lot of Ne-Mar Shopping Center or the parking lot of Pixley Lumber Company, to visit with their friends.  My sister and I were in town that day, dragging main.  We passed Laura and waved at her.  That was the last time we saw her.  Later the authorities found her car abandoned.  Her purse and her keys were still in the car, but no sign of Laura.  There were no signs of a struggle.

On the day Laura disappeared, she was to meet up with some friends to attend church.  She never showed up.  Ten days after her disappearance,  witnesses called authorities because of the smell.  The authorities found her nude body in a ditch beside a country road.  The body was investigated by Sheriff Scott Walton and his officers.   Laura was a very naevi girl, way to trusting for her own good.  She didn't seem to ever see a stranger.  That is what probably caused her abduction and death.  

April 29, 1998, CBS News Tulsa, Oklahoma reminded the public about this long forgotten case of the Murder of 18 year old Laura Long.  The article was entitled, "Who Killed Laura Long?"  For 21 years this case from 1977 had gone cold, despite of hundreds of hours of investigation, interviews and tips.  The Claremore Police never arrested anyone.  In 1998, the Police Department decided to reopen this cold case, after reading the article, Who Killed Laura Long?  Someone anonymously wrote 3 letters to investigators pointing a finger at a man who lived near by.  He was a former Claremore resident, who had moved over a hour away from Claremore.  He claimed he was innocent.  He took a lie detector test and failed.  Flunking such a test has no weight in a court of law.  No one was ever arrested for her murder.  Intent on solving the cold case, the FBI at that time was in the process of conducting DNA testing on on Laura's clothes (where were her clothes found?) to see if the DNA on her clothes matched a suspect's DNA.  No match was ever made.  So again the case went cold.

An article about this cold case appeared on June 15, 2023, by Sharon Phillips.  Inked on yellowed old newspapers, lies the story of a  beautiful, 18 year old girl named Laura Long.  This case involves a brutal murder, and sexual assault that left a community devastated and a marriage destroyed.  As report from the beginning, Laura left her house and drove into town to buy gas.  She went missing without a trace.  Pat Riley Reeder is the former managing editor of the Claremore Daily Progress Newspaper.  Pat told 2 News, this case was one of those cases you should never have to see.  And it is one she has never been able to forget.  

Laura's parents came to Pat and asked her to put the story of Laura's murder in the paper.  Pat asked them if they had been to the Police and FBI.  She told them to wait 24 hours to see if Laura eventually came home.  Sad to say, she never came home.  Before the 24 hours were up, Pat says, they knew Laura was dead.  Pat was broken hearted and took crime scene photos of the body for law enforcement...including some of the first photographs capturing the crime scene where Laura's body was found.  Pat said, "I saw the body in the ditch, and the investigators said it probably was Laura." She felt really sure the body was Laura.  Her death was too much for her family.  The incident ended in the break-up of her parent's marriage.  Her mother nearly lost her mind, and felt a little to blame. 

To make matters worse, Reeder felt that there were problems with the investigation from the start.  She believes the case was handled poorly.  Roger's County Sheriffs investigators say they eliminated numerous people as suspects at the time Laura went missing, and after her body was found.  Her loved ones have waited years with no signs of any closure in the case.  

I was informed years later that an arrest was made of her killer, but he died before he could be prosecuted.  How true that information is,  I will never know.  Her disappearance and murder stays with me.  Was there something I could have done different to save her life?  Someone I personally know was interviewed and taken to view her body.  Here it is 2026, and the case has never been solved.  Will the Long family ever see the person who did this horrible crime behind bars?  I truly Pray to God the case will be solved some day soon.  


Connie Johnston James




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