Murder victim from Ohio was strangled, stabbed

Lynn Jackenheimer, the Ashland, Ohio woman who disappeared July 4, was strangled and stabbed before her body was put in a plastic bag and dumped in Frisco, the Dare County sheriff said Tuesday.

Sheriff Doug Doughtie said in a press conference that an autopsy by the medical examiner in Greenville had determined that both were the cause of death.

Bulletins have gone out nationwide on Nathan Summerfield, a former boyfriend who had been vacationing in Salvo with Jackenheimer and her two children the week of July 4. A warrant has been issued for his arrest on a charge of first-degree murder.

“The warrant for Nathan Summerfield has been entered into NCIC, the national crime database, and he is listed nationally as a wanted person for this charge,” Doughtie said.

“The U.S. Marshals Office, Eastern District of North Carolina, has been notified and they are assisting the U.S. Marshals Office in Ohio and the Ashland County Sheriff’s Office in locating Nathan Summerfield.”

Jackenheimer was last heard from when she called a friend late July 3. Doughtie, citing the ongoing investigation, said he was unable to answer in detail many questions about what might have happened after that.

“We’re not exactly sure what was going on at the time of her death,” Doughtie said. “The last place she was seen alive that we can say was at the residence where they were actually staying at — in the rental cottage. And that’s really all I can say about that.”

Jackenheimer, Summerfield and the two children were staying in Hatteras Colony about 30 minutes north of where her body was found. Summerfield is the father of the youngest child, a 3-year-old boy.

Authorities started to search the Salvo area July 9, a Monday, after a dispatcher in Ohio received a call from Summerfield’s brother, Jake. He said that his brother, after returning the children to Ashland, told him he had strangled Jackenheimer.

The body was found Saturday at about 4:30 p.m. by a man who said he noticed a smell and saw a plastic bag in some tall grass in the Village at Salt Creek, a secluded subdivision on the soundside of Hatteras Island between Frisco Rod and Gun and the Quarterdeck Restaurant.

He told a dispatcher that he thought he had found a woman’s body and saw a “Hooters” T-shirt inside the bag.

Summerfield was last seen July 8 in security photos at a bank in Ashland.

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