On June 28, 1989, the body of 28-year-old Kimberly Lyttle, a white woman from Riverside County, California, was found in Cottonwood Canyon. Her body showed severe trauma and the autopsy listed asphyxiation as the cause of death; alcohol and drugs were present in her system. Investigators recovered pubic hairs and fibers on her body that did not belong to her and hoped those traces would help identify the killer.

Lyttle had a documented history of drug use and prostitution. Her murder fitted a disturbing pattern of killings in Riverside County in the late 1980s and early 1990s, in which women involved in prostitution and drug use were found strangled and, in some cases, mutilated. The crimes were later tied to a suspect who was charged in multiple deaths; forensic links cited in the investigation included hairs, fibers, tire tracks and shoe impressions.

Anyone who knew Kimberly, her routines, or saw activity around Cottonwood Canyon in June 1989 is asked to share information that could still help clarify what happened that day.