Link’s attorney Dennis Lieberman said previously that while Link certainly knew Anderson, he had nothing to do with her death.
Credit: Montgomery County Jail
Credit: Montgomery County Jail
Link reported to the Kettering Police Department on July 30, 2001, that Anderson had not been seen since July 28, 2001, and that her red 1997 Oldsmobile Silhouette also was missing from their shared home in the 4500 block of Far Hills Avenue in Kettering, just south of David Road.
Anderson’s two daughters, then 7 and 9, remained home and police records show that Link told officers he would continue to care for the girls during the investigation into their mother’s disappearance.
The missing persons case evolved into a homicide investigation when a badly burned body was discovered Aug. 16, 2001, in rural Ross County in south central Ohio, about an hour and a half from Dayton. DNA testing confirmed the body was Anderson, Kettering police said.
A few months later, on Oct. 23, 2001, Atlanta police found Anderson’s minivan abandoned in their airport parking lot, Prosecutor Mat Heck Jr. said during a January media briefing announcing Link’s indictment.
Anderson’s cause of death was ruled multiple blunt force trauma to the head.
In 2002, a Montgomery County grand jury found there was not sufficient evidence for an indictment.
“Homicide cases are never closed investigations,” said Lynda Dodd, deputy chief of the criminal division of the Montgomery County Prosecutor’s Office. “They always remain open, and this case right here is an excellent example of that.”
Documents from the case have been sealed by the trial judge, but prosecutors said diligent police work and scientific breakthroughs were credited with Link’s arrest. Investigators uncovered additional witnesses and completed further interviews. And new digital forensic evidence testing was done that was not available two decades ago, the prosecutor said.
In the years after Anderson’s death, Link led a stable life as a father and husband who worked for an insurance company, Lieberman said. A background search only found a few traffic violations and one for fishing without a license.
Link has been held in the Montgomery County Jail since his Jan. 13 arrest at his home.
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