Virdia Beard, 37, was found unresponsive on the porch of a residence on the 200 block of North 9th Street in Newark on April 28, 2017. Officers and emergency medical personnel discovered she had sustained multiple gunshot wounds; she was pronounced dead at the scene at 1:38 a.m.

Within a week investigators arrested 30-year-old Turqoise Williams and the Essex County Prosecutor’s Office identified Williams as the suspect in Beard’s shooting death. At a bail hearing prosecutors described the killing as an act of domestic violence and said Williams and Beard had been in a romantic relationship. Williams was charged with murder, witness tampering, unlawful possession of a weapon, possession of a weapon for an unlawful purpose, and being a convicted felon in possession of a firearm. She was held without bail at the Essex County Correctional Facility pending trial.

Williams died in custody on October 22, 2017; authorities did not release the cause of her death. Does anyone have information about Virdia Beard or the relationship that led to her death?