Thirty-one-year-old Alva Cooke lived in Sheffield, England, with her boyfriend. Sometime in April of 1986, Alva told her partner that she was going to Keyworth to visit her parents but would return the following day. He never heard from her again.
On May 5th, 1986, a sailor spotted something beneath a branch in the River Trent in Newark, Nottinghamshire. Closer inspection revealed this to be a body, which would eventually be identified as that of Alva Cooke. Her legs had been bound together with green corded rope, and she had likely died from drowning, though she’d been in the water so long that a definite cause of death couldn’t be established.
The coroner determined that there was no other sign of violence on the body, and speculated that the death might have been a suicide, as the ropes around the ankles could have been tied by Alva herself. At the inquest, an open verdict was returned.
Police kept their options open, and also questioned her boyfriend in the event that Alva had been murdered. There was insufficient evidence to charge him with any crime, however, and a further search for suspects yielded nothing of substance.
The mysterious death of Alva Cooke is still unresolved, nearly forty years later.
Crime Immemorial 