Stay Signed In
Do you want to access your site more quickly on this computer? Check this box, and your username and password will be remembered for two weeks. Click logout to turn this off.
Stay Safe
Do not check this box if you are using a public computer. You don't want anyone seeing your personal info or messing with your site.
Amanda N. Lankey, age 13 of Florida, formerly of White Cloud, passed away unexpectedly on Monday, July 5, 2004. Amanda was born on June 7, 1991 in White County, Tennessee and was going into the 8th Grade at Powell Middle School in Florida where she did enjoyed school and did well with her grades. Amanda loved to listen to music, dance and using makeup. She enjoyed spending time with her friends including talking on the phone with her many friends. She also enjoyed writing poetry.
Amanda is survived by her mother, Victoria Lankey of Florida; her sisters and brothers, James Khan of Florida; Justin Lankey of Florida; Wanda Lankey of Florida; Erica Johnson of Michigan; Kelly Johnson of Michigan; Lorrie Wrouble of Michigan; her grandparents, Tom (Linda) Verhoy of White Cloud; Sue (Junior) Stringfield of Detroit, Michigan; aunts and uncles, Anna Wylie; Candace Isa; Tom Verhoy; Joe Verhoy; John Verhoy; her nephews, Jacob Wrouble; Xavier Wrouble; many cousins; several great aunts and uncles; her special friends, Larry Jarrett; Michael Barylski; Jessica Foster; June Greene; Tabitha Verhoy.
A baffling crime remains unsolved in West Michigan.
It's been nearly 18 months, and the family of murdered Amanda Lankey has come and gone again in their search for elusive clues. They don't plan on closure coming in a box with a bow this Christmas. But a mother would sure like to know: who killed my daughter?
"It will never be the same. I want to get mad... I just want to get mad," said Victoria Lankey.
Lankey sits around the family table in White Cloud, wiping a tear of the heartbreak she wears. "I thought it was going to be easier this time,' she said. "I guess not."
The town is still marked nay scarred by what happened. "When people see me in town they know why I'm here. When they see me they see Amanda and I know they haven't forgotten about her," Lankey said.
The case is all but settled. Amanda, 13, was in town visiting friends. The family had fled south years before from an abusive and now imprisoned father. Amanda was last seen at a friends house on a hot summers night, when he met a torturous end and was dumped in a forest.
The case has been probed. Her online chats with the sign-on name: Skitzo Killa. Another deceptive suspect, and the blood found in his ditched car, leads to nothing...
Thirteen-year-old girl Amanda Lankey of White Cloud was last seen in late June after she sneaked out the window of a friend's house in the middle of the night. Authorities thought she had been talking to someone on the Internet and possibly ran away to meet that person.
Officials with the Newaygo County Sheriff's Department say some people were picking mushrooms in the Manistee National Forest near 20th Street and Pine Avenue when they found a body a few days later.
Investigators think Amanda was killed somewhere else and dumped in those woods because there wasn't any blood at the scene or dirt on her feet. The medical examiner said Amanda died from a blow to the head, from something like a baseball bat or a metal pipe.
Authorities have been stumped ever since in regards to finding the killer.
“It's tough...it's still tough. The main thing, I'll be glad when it's done,” Amanda’s grandmother, Linda Verhoy, told 24 Hour News 8. “I'll sit and look at her picture and I just start crying...it's not easy.”
“I'm hurt...to think someone could be so cruel. How do you take a child and hurt them that way?” she asks.
Now some newly released court documents shed some light on the investigation.
24 Hour News 8 has obtained some search warrants involving the investigation.
Authorities requested phone records from Sprint, Cingular, and other companies to establish a timeline of who Amanda was talking to.
The records contained area codes from Michigan (231/616), Indiana (317), Texas (817), and New York (315/718).
Another piece of new evidence is a computer Amanda used for Instant Messaging. Her last I.M. involved talking to a man 24 Hour News 8 is calling “Joe.” Amanda said, “Talk to me ‘Joe’...'Joe', if are you still on, talk to me…it's important.”
“Joe’s” sign-on name began with "skit-zo_killa." Detectives noted in interviews that he appeared to be deceptive.
Another clue into who killed Amanda leads to the house where Amanda spent the night she disappeared. Police say Amanda was talking online before she slipped out a window. But with whom was she talking to?
A witness noted that night "a ‘guy’ came to the home on a bike to the bedroom window and talked with Amanda." Could he be the killer?
A search warrant doesn't say why, but officers impounded a foreign import SUV. They found a red sleeping bag, hair and fibers, receipts, an earring, and two red carpet pieces inside the vehicle.
Investigators followed up on these clues, but were still unable to make an arrest.
Officers won't get specific, but they say every forensic sample and bit of DNA they have drummed up is still being tested at the Michigan State Police Crime Lab in Grand Rapids.
A DNA backlog at this crime lab, not to mention many others, is hurting the investigation as well.
When asked how long it will take, a spokesperson says they are working on it.
Authorities have said all along they have not ruled anyone out when it comes to who is a suspect. Now, for the first time, they have keyed in on certain individuals.
Police officials won't comment specifically about what 24 Hour News 8 has discovered, like the questions posed in our final warrant.
A man who we will call “Frank” appeared on the police radar, and when questioned, said he "didn't know Amanda."
Others, however, he did know the teen, and he even "questioned her as to whether she still slept in the same bedroom she had earlier."
Investigators also deemed “Frank” as being "deceptive."
Others said after Amanda's disappearance, they helped “Frank” "strip a portion of the back seat and floor matting from his car."
Police officials looked for that car, a 1980s four-door, and found it abandoned 150 miles away. They searched it and found hair fibers, knives, a woman's garter, cigarette butts, and a red color crusted stain.
While they still wait on that same DNA test results, authorities can't tell us what all this means. Plus, as the case is open and maybe newer, unavailable warrants hold other clues.
These are the known little pieces of the puzzle. “It's not as fast as I'd like it to be,” Verhoy said. “I have confidence they are doing their job…they're gonna find who did it.”
Although she wants that, Verhoy wonders what will it bring. “I can still in my mind hear her in her silly little way say, ‘Grandma’, and tilt her head like she wants something...and I'll never hear that anymore.”
For now, Lankey’s family will wait for what could be answers in the crime lab.
Authorities have said in the past they do not believe Amanda was killed by someone who is likely to strike again.
A baseball bat or some other blunt instrument was used to fatally beat a 13-year-oldgirl found dead after shapparently snuck out of a friend’s home during a sleepover, the Newaygo County medical examiner said Thursday.Richard Peters told Grand Rapids station WOOD-TV that Amanda Lankey, a Florida resident who lived in White Cloud until earlier this year, died from a blow to the head that shattered her skull and jaw. A telephone message seeking further comment was left at his office. Mushroom hunters discovered her decomposing body Tuesday in a section of the Manistee National Forest in Big Prairie Township, about eight miles from her friend’s White Cloud home. Investigators had not determined whether Amanda was slain in the forest or her body was dumped there afterward. They were awaiting tests to determine whether she was sexually assaulted. Her funeral was scheduled for Friday afternoon in White Cloud. “We’re in the early stages of a homicide and to give out too much information could compromise the investigation,” Newaygo County Prosecutor Chrystal Roach told The Grand Rapids Press. Authorities said Wednesday at a news conference they were trying to retrace the girl’s last steps and formed the task force— made up of investigators from the White Cloud Police Department, the Newaygo County Sheriff’s Department, the Michigan State Police and the FBI —to handle the case. “From here, it’s going to tke on the course of an intensive investigation,”
