On September 1, 1995, Lori Murchison and her boyfriend, Jerry Cogan, were arrested during a routine traffic stop. According to reports, Cogan was arrested on suspicion of driving while intoxicated. Murchison was arrested on suspicion of public intoxication.
The next morning, 24-year-old, Murchison was released from jail. Witnesses at the time say that Murchison left the jail with the intent of picking up her paycheck at the Oaks Lodge Nursing Home in Fort Smith so she could come back and bail out Cogan.
Murchison made it to the office of the Continental Motel in Fort Smith to get a key to her room. Reports say she arrived at the Continental Motel between 2-4 pm.
However, Murchison never made it to the Oaks Lodge Nursing Home to pick up her paycheck, and she never showed up to bail Cogan out of jail.
On September 5, Lori’s mother, Nancy Murchison, reported her missing. According to reports, Nancy had last spoken to Lori on September 2. Lori told her mom that she and Cogan were moving out and had found a room at the Continental Motel. She also told her mom that she would pick up her then 4-year-old daughter, Brittney, the next day.
Lori Murchison never arrived. She simply vanished.
Over the years, Lori’s case has been in the hands of different detectives in Fort Smith. None of the detectives made much headway in the case until 2003 when a detective started investigating information that indicated Lori could have died from an overdose and that someone disposed of her body.
According to reports, investigators had a credible suspect and had enough evidence to file charges against this man for disposing of a corpse. However, due to the statute of limitations, authorities couldn’t press charges.
Prior to her disappearance, Murchison had been traveling back and forth between Fort Smith and Fort Coffee, Oklahoma and Wilburton, Oklahoma. Why? Could it have been drug related? Reports indicate that Lori was heavily involved with the drug scene in 1995.
In fact, about three weeks before Lori went missing, her mother (now deceased) claimed that Lori came home in a panic one night shouting , “They are going to off me!”
Who would want to kill Lori? And why?
Lori’s family never suspected she was involved in drugs - and they have gone on record stating that they never noticed a change in her behavior that would indicate she was on involved in that kind of a lifestyle.
Years ago, one lead in the case caused investigators to dig up a section of a Fort Smith salvage yard after someone claimed she had been buried there.
The salvage yard is roughly one mile away from the motel where Lori was last seen.
Investigators brought in a backhoe, an anthropologist and an archaeologist but their efforts turned up nothing.
What happened to Lori Murchison?
Somebody knows.
If you have any information about the disappearance of Lori Murchison, contact the Fort Smith Police Department at 479-785-4221.
