Seventeen-year-old Donna Jean Awcock left a babysitting assignment in northeast London, Ontario, at about 2:30 a.m. on October 13, 1983, to walk to a nearby convenience store. Witnesses later said she appeared upset at the store and asked to use the telephone but was refused. That was the last confirmed sighting of her alive.

Donna’s body was found on October 14 about two kilometres from her home near the Thames River, just west of Fanshawe Dam. Investigators determined she had been sexually assaulted and died of manual strangulation. Biological material recovered in the investigation produced a male DNA profile that has not matched anyone in Canada’s National DNA Data Bank.

Over the years the Ontario Provincial Police pursued leads, including testing and excluding a fugitive who had been living locally under an alias, and other persons of interest were examined or eliminated. No one has been charged; the case remains open and the Ontario government has offered a reward for information leading to an arrest and conviction. If anyone knew Donna or remembers that night or the area around Cheyenne Avenue, would you please come forward with what you know?