Three Wyoming residents have been charged with kidnapping and will likely be charged with murder in connection with the death of a woman whose body was found near Denver on Friday.
Shantel Edlund, 43, and Leo VanBuskirk, 23, both of Sheridan, and Casey Childers, 39, of Casper, have been charged with first-degree kidnapping and will likely be charged with first-degree murder in connection with the death of the unidentified woman, according to the Aurora, Colorado, Police Department.
Department officials did not immediately return Cowboy State Daily’s request for comment on Monday.
According to department officials, its major crimes unit was notified by the Fort Collins Police Department on Dec. 16 about a missing person its officers had been trying to find. Information collected during the investigation led Fort Collins police to believe that the missing 29-year-old woman was last seen in Aurora.
Aurora police began investigating and believed the woman might have been kidnapped in the city on Nov. 6. Suspects in the woman’s kidnapping, two men and a woman, were last seen driving a 2016 Chevrolet Malibu.
Detectives found that the Malibu was seen in Douglas County, Colorado, where Aurora sits, on Nov. 7.
Edlund, VanBuskirk and Childers were arrested by police in Sheridan, Wyoming, on Wednesday on unrelated charges.
Detectives from the Aurora Police Major Crimes Unit drove to Wyoming on Wednesday to question the three and on Thursday, warrants for their arrest on charges of first-degree kidnapping were obtained.
On Friday, investigators discovered the body of a woman in rural Douglas County in Colorado. The woman, whose identity has not been released, had been shot to death.
Edlund, VanBuskirk and Childers remain in custody at the Sheridan County Detention Center.
Police are still looking for information, which can be submitted to the Metro Denver Crime Stoppers at 720-913-7867.
