Disclaimer: This article contains mentions of murder. Reader discretion is advised.
Taken Together: Who Killed Lyric and Elizabeth?, the latest documentary series on Max, delves into the shocking Evansdale double murders. The three-part series chronicles the July 2012 disappearances of 10-year-old Lyric Cook and her 8-year-old cousin Elizabeth Collins. The investigation began as a missing person’s case. The girls’ bodies were found in the Seven Bridges Wildlife Area later that year.
According to The Daily Beast, cousins Lyric and Elizabeth disappeared while riding their bikes on July 13, 2012. The incident occurred around noon in their neighborhood. Authorities launched an extensive investigation into the vanishing. It would be months until hunters found their remains several miles away from Evansdale in the Seven Bridges Wildlife Area. Investigators have not revealed details about the murders of Lyric and Elizabeth to preserve information that may lead them to the killer.
Max’s Taken Together: Who Killed Lyric and Elizabeth? is local news photographer Dylan Sires’ directorial debut. Sires worked on Lyric Cook and Elizabeth Collins’ missing case for over a decade now. He pursued the story from different angles looking for potential suspects and has conducted hundreds of interviews. His work on the case serves as the base of the latest documentary series.
Taken Together: Who killed Lyric & Elizabeth?
The Taken Together documentary looks into speculation about who killed Lyric Cook and Elizabeth Collins. Reportedly, the girls went missing on July 13, 2012, from an Evansdale, Iowa, neighborhood. Later that same year, on December 5, 2012, hunters found their bodies in the secluded wildlife area. Autopsy results later confirmed that the remains were of Lyric and Elizabeth, per CBS News.
Authorities never released the full autopsy of the cause of death of Lyric and Elizabeth. They believe not releasing key details about the case can preserve the continuity of the evidence. Investigators also believe that the location of their bodies can prove crucial in finding the potential killer, reported KCRG. Bremer County Detective Jason Ellison said, “We do believe that it is somebody that is familiar with the Meyers Lake area and Seven Bridges area,” Ellison began working on the case in 2017. Taken Together: Who Killed Lyric and Elizabeth? documentary examines the thorough investigation that followed.
Moreover, the Iowa Division of Criminal Investigation (DCI) has been involved in Lyric Cook and Elizabeth Collins’ murder from the outset. One of DCI’s lead investigators, Scott Reger, backed Ellison’s theory. Reger believes, “You’d have to know it was there, you’d have to be familiar with it, you’re not just gonna be driving down Highway 20 and stumble on to Seven Bridges. You have to know that it’s there.” DCI investigators have been unsuccessfully hunting down leads for more than a decade.
At first, investigators did have a break in the case, or so they thought. They started drawing comparisons to a similar high-profile murder case that occurred not far from Evansdale in Dayton, Iowa. The case was about the kidnappings of Kathlynn Shepard, 15, and Dezi Hughes, 12, in May 2013, months after Lyric and Elizabeth’s murders. Reportedly, Dezi escaped the captor, but Kathlynn’s dead body was found a few weeks after the abductions.
Taken Together: Who Killed Lyric and Elizabeth? tries to draw comparisons between both cases. The Daily Beast reported that the culprit responsible was Michael Klunder, a convicted and violent sex offender. Investigators looked into him as a potential suspect, but they failed to find links. Once Dezi escaped, Klunder disposed of Kathlynn’s body in a river and then died by suicide. Afterward, in 2014, Evansdale police ruled out Klunder as a suspect in the murders of Lyric Cook and Elizabeth Collins.
Dylan Sires’ Taken Together documentary looks into other possible connections, including the 2016 arrest of pedophilic sexual abuser Jeff Altmayer. Additionally, the documentary mentions the Delphi, Indiana, murders of Abigail Williams and Liberty Germane (Abyy and Libby). A suspect named Richard Allen is currently facing murder charges in connection with Abby and Libby Delphi murders. Nonetheless, the links between all cases are only circumstantial.
The Evansdale murders of Lyric Cook and Elizabeth Collins are yet to be solved. Taken Together: Who Killed Lyric and Elizabeth? premiered on August 8, 2024, and is now streaming on Max.
