Martha Marty Erickson, 47, of Carlisle, Iowa, was found dead in shallow water at Avon Lake on Thanksgiving Day, November 23, 1995. The state medical examiner determined she had been brutally beaten and stabbed. Time spent in the water washed away physical evidence and made it impossible to determine whether she had also been sexually assaulted.

Detectives with the Polk County Sheriff’s Office struggled to build a timeline because many people in Erickson’s circle, particularly from the AA community she supported, knew one another only by first names and were reluctant to speak. Investigators named persons of interest over the years, including Donald Piper and Jerry Lee Proctor, but never developed enough evidence to charge anyone in Erickson’s murder. Two friends of hers, Susan Kersten and Donna Lee Marshall, were murdered in the surrounding months, and police investigated possible links between the three killings but found no definitive connection.

No arrest has been announced in Martha Erickson’s case. Does anyone who knew Marty or was in that community in 1995 have information that could help solve her murder?