MI MI - Bernita White, 42, Lansing, 23 June 2001

[Nina Michigan]

42 year old mother of two Bernita White was walking toward the entrance of the Potter Park Zoo in Lansing with her 5 year old daughter when a sniper's bullet cut through her left arm, pierced her heart and exited the other side of her body. The bullet was never recovered. White died at the scene.

Upon hearing of her daughter's murder, Bernita's mother, Barbara Sims of Detroit, collapsed and died of a heart attack. Mother and daughter died the same day.

Bernita was in the midst of a divorce from her Michigan State Police Trooper husband, Artis White.

Lansing Pulse Article

Dramatized You Tube video from Lansing's Most Wanted

NBC Affiliate story from May 2013

No arrests were made, no one was ever charged, last I heard her husband, who wrote a book about the case and produced a documentary about being falsely accused, is still a state trooper.

 

[Tutskee]

Thank you for posting this case - long over due. Hoping the exposure on this site brings forth justice for Bernita.

 

[Richard]

Bernita White

Bernita White was shot and killed in 2001 near the entrance to Potter Park Zoo. Her killing remains unsolved.
(Photo: LSJ file photo)

On a June afternoon in 2001, Bernita White and her 5-year-old daughter were walking toward the entrance of Potter Park Zoo.

What happened next has been the subject of investigations by two different police agencies.

White, then 41, was shot with a high-powered rifle from about 100 yards away. She died at the hospital.

Witnesses told police they heard one or two shots that might have come from a wooded area north of the zoo entrance. But no one saw the shooter.

About 20 Lansing police officers, six detectives and every dog tracking team that could get there searched the area. A Michigan State Police helicopter gave investigators an aerial view. Police divers searched for evidence that might have been thrown in the Red Cedar River.

Police even brought in a handler with a cadaver-sniffing dog to help locate evidence. The handler claimed that the dog found a bullet fragment. However, tests showed the fragment did not come from the bullet that killed White. The handler later pleaded guilty to federal charges that she planted bones and other fake evidence in cases she worked. She was not charged for her work in the White case.

Sixteen years later, White's killing remains unsolved. Police previously identified a suspect, but he was never charged.

LINK:

Serial killers, unsolved homicides: A look at some of Lansing's infamous cases