CHENEY – A Feb. 16 post on the Spokane County Medical Examiner’s Office confirmed the cause and manner of death of Loghan Starbuck, a 25-year-old Cheney woman who went missing on Dec. 18, 2021. But that information is not being released to the public at this time.
On Jan. 10 of this year, authorities pulled her body from the Spokane River.
While police cannot release any information during an ongoing investigation, Plan B Forensics LLC, a local forensic and expert witness service in criminal investigations, was heavily involved in her search. Their work on the case details what happened to Loghan, from when she went missing to when police found her body.
“In this situation, you have a person who’s autistic—you have someone who’s in fear for her life and went missing under suspicious circumstances,” said Plan B Forensics Suzan Marshall, founder and certified medical death investigator.
When pressed why Marshall thought Loghan would be fearful of her life and the suspicious circumstances she was referencing, Marshall said she couldn’t’ release the information right now.
However, a case log she provided the Cheney Free Press indicates Loghan’s brother Blake contacted Marshall on Dec. 22. He told her Loghan was missing and the last person in contact with her was a redacted ex-partner of some kind. The case log also revealed Blake told Dateline NBC that his sister was dealing with a breakup around the time of her disappearance.
A timeline of events crossed referenced with Marshall, Blake and the Cheney Police Department verifies video footage taken on Dec. 18 shows Loghan on a bus en route from Cheney to downtown Spokane.
A couple walking through Riverside Park on Dec. 19 found her belongings and took them to the Spokane Parks Visitation Center lost and found. The attendant then heard Loghan’s name on the news and realized it was the name on the ID that the couple turned in.
“It was odd her belongings were packaged—her wallet, hat, keys, and bus pass,” Marshall said.
Cheney Police Captain Nate Conley said the department came into possession of the belongings on Dec. 23. But police didn’t notify Blake about it until Dec. 27. He still struggles with the department’s reasoning to withhold what he say are vital clues that could have helped in the search.
“About a week had gone by and the Cheney Police were aware of this,” Blake said solemnly. “We had dogs available and ready to go.”
According to Blake, the Cheney Police Department told him and other family members they were trying to be respectful of their holidays and didn’t want to deliver the news on Christmas.
“I just don’t get that,” Blake said, “it didn’t make us feel any better knowing our sister is gone. I’d much rather had been out there with dogs on Christmas trying to track her down.”
Conley said the department went through the standard procedure to get a search warrant to look at Loghan’s phone records and for anything that might help with the investigation, and that took time to do so.
“We couldn’t have released the belongings right away,” Conley said. “We couldn’t release it to him until we processed them first.”
Loghan’s belongings were found in some snow below a historical sign on a walking trail on the northern side of the pedestrian bridge in Riverside Park. Once Marshall and Blake had this information, they arranged for the help of Misty Wegner and her K9 search unit. Wegner is a volunteer K9 handler with the Stevens County K9 Search and Rescue Team.
Wegner and her dogs searched shoreline areas south of Canada Island on Dec.27, tracking Loghan’s scent to the north side of the pedestrian bridge where the couple walking through the park found her belongings.
Marshall said the tips stopped rolling in on Dec. 26. But Marshall continued her search by combing through the Spokane Transit Authority’s (STA) plaza and the surrounding shelters and businesses in downtown Spokane. While talking to shelter and homeless residents in the area, Marshall and the Starbuck family came across multiple witnesses who saw Loghan around the plaza and at Canon Shelter and House of Charity.
According to Marshall’s case log, eyewitness accounts about Loghan varied. One witness said they saw her with a tall man (6’4”) with a light chocolate complexion who goes by the name of Frank. Another witness said she talked to Loghan for over an hour and that Loghan refused to come inside the warming center because “she was afraid someone would seek her out and kill her.”
The Starbuck family continues to search for answers surrounding Loghan’s mysterious disappearance and death in the wake of police finding her body.
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