Maria G. Villanueva, 43, was last seen on the evening of Friday, December 15, 2017, after driving her dark gray Kia Sportage to the Casa Bellisima apartments in Glendale, Arizona, for a date with her longtime boyfriend. Around 8:30 p.m. a man in dark clothes approached her car; for reasons that remain unknown Villanueva let him into the driver’s seat while she moved to the passenger side. At 8:52 p.m. her Kia was seen leaving the complex and she was never seen alive again.

That night residents in south central Phoenix heard gunshots between about 11 p.m. and midnight; later one person reported seeing a dark-colored Kia driving in an alley with its headlights off. Early the next morning an officer spotted Villanueva’s Kia and a police helicopter tracked the vehicle until the helicopter stopped pursuit around 3:24 a.m. At 9:41 a.m. on December 16 a resident found Villanueva shot three times in an alley near Third and Mohave streets; three 9 mm casings, a purse, and a cellphone were recovered at the scene. Her daughter reported her missing the following day after the boyfriend had not heard from her, and detectives impounded her Kia. Investigators later linked the killing to Cleophus Cooksey Jr.

Are there readers who were in south central Phoenix that night or who remember seeing a dark Kia in alleys that could help fill gaps in the timeline?