On the evening of Wednesday, June 22, 2022, 77-year-old Dinah Davis Northcutt was found dead in her home on Highway 315 in the Summerhill area near Columbiana, Alabama. Shelby County deputies had responded earlier that night after a 911 call about a suspicious person near Highway 97; information developed at that initial scene led them to Northcutt’s residence where investigators pronounced her deceased and called in the Criminal Investigations Division to open a homicide probe.

Investigators focused the inquiry on a family member. Authorities arrested 31-year-old Richard Alan Howell, identified as Northcutt’s grandson and a Columbiana resident, and charged him with murder. Howell was being held in the Shelby County Jail with bond set at $150,000.

What details about that evening or the family’s movements might help explain how the case unfolded? If anyone knew Dinah Northcutt or has information about her last hours, please come forward.