GA Markisha Brown, 16, Atlanta, 31 May 1995

[Galadriel]

$10,000 reward to find pregnant teen's killer

Investigators hope a $10,000 reward will help solve the cold-case murder of 16-year-old Markisha Brown, a pregnant teenager who was found strangled and left in a dumpster...

Her sister said on May 31, 1995, Brown was supposed to be at Columbia High School that morning, and somehow left her home. Her sister fears she was taken, because Brown left her curling iron on; that is something the glamour girl would not normally do.

Later that morning, someone called police to report a body found in a dumpster off Donald Lee Hollowell and I-285 at the Texaco gas station. Brown's body was found-face down inside...

Markisha lived in Decatur (intown suburb), but her body was found in northwest Atlanta, 19 miles from her house, shortly before 1:00pm on May 31, 1995. I don't know how to cite articles accessed through ProQuest since they can't be linked, but there's a follow-up article in March 1999 that discusses the only identified suspect in her murder, her stepfather, Daryl/Darryl Lucas, who was alleged to have made sexual advances and been rebuffed. According to the county DA at the time, there wasn't enough evidence to press charges. No other suspect has been identified.

 

[RookieInvestigator]

This is sad and senseless...It sounds like she was getting ready for school and someone came to the door unexpectedly...A stranger or someone in her neighborhood who knew the families routine or was watching the house...Unless it was her stepfather that waited until she was alone..

I'm wondering if they questioned the unborn child's father...

 

[Galadriel]

This is sad and senseless...It sounds like she was getting ready for school and someone came to the door unexpectedly...A stranger or someone in her neighborhood who knew the families routine or was watching the house...Unless it was her stepfather that waited until she was alone..

I'm wondering if they questioned the unborn child's father...

I wondered the same thing. None of the articles I've read mention his identity. The police only ever identified the stepfather as a suspect, so presumably they knew who the baby's father was and ruled him out, but that hasn't been explicitly stated in anything I've read.

I reported my own post to ask the question about sharing information from password-protected articles, because there's really a lot of useful background information in the newspaper archives, and it all seems to point very strongly to the stepfather being responsible. County records show he and Markisha's mom divorced in 1997, then Markisha's mom died in 2005, apparently of natural causes (meaning not accidental or foul play).

I keep coming back to her earrings in that picture. It takes a big personality to carry off earrings like that, someone with a clearly defined sense of self who's confident enough to handle attention, both wanted and unwanted. From the linked article:

Brown was known as a fashionable teenager who loved having fun, putting on fashion shows, and was a popular student at Columbia High School where she participated in track.

Markisha strikes me a bright, bold presence who wasn't easily intimidated, and it seems like a special insult to put her body in a dumpster, the girl who was so particular about her hair, makeup, and clothes, always making sure she looked just so. To me, it sounds personal.