CEDAR RAPIDS — It took 40 years, but jurors deliberated just three hours to find Jerry Lynn Burns guilty of first-degree murder in the stabbing death of Michelle Martinko. The 18-year-old Kennedy High School student died in her family’s Buick outside of Westdale Mall in Cedar Rapids in December 1979. More: Case begins against Jerry […]
You are browsing archives for
Tag: Michelle Martinko
“Forever 18” Prosecution begins in Miche
The mystery of who killed Michelle Martinko, an 18-year-old Kennedy High School student stabbed to death outside of Westdale Mall in Cedar Rapids, has haunted Iowans for 40 years. Her body was found in the family Buick in the mall parking lot in the early morning hours of Dec. 20, 1979. She was last seen […]
Final photos: end of an era at Westdale ...
I’m not only a Homegrown Iowan, I’m also a native of Cedar Rapids, and in living on the west side of the city, Westdale Mall was a major point of pride for a teen growing up in the “mall” years. Once Westdale opened, we didn’t have to go all the way across town to Lindale […]