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Erotic Asphyxiation Gone Wrong or Murder for Money?

Husband applies for $280,000 in life insurance policies then claims his wife’s death was an accident.

Rivy Lyon
6 min readJun 30, 2022
Mona Lisa Abney. Findagrave

Twenty-seven years after 25-year-old Mona Lisa Abney was found bruised, raped, and strangled in her hotel room, her husband turned himself in to the police for murder. The Fairfax County Homicide Cold Case Unit decided to take another look at the case, reinterviewing many of the previous witnesses and going over the initial case reports.

The DNA was sent into the forensics lab for analysis. This hadn’t been done before as the technology in 1978 was not yet advanced enough. This time, they found a match, and the elusive killer was finally brought to justice.

On the 28th of January 1978 at Tysons Corner, Fairfax County, Virginia a maid entered the hotel room to tidy up and found a female body lying on the floor. The maid noticed Mona’s belongings were strewn about the room. The alarm clock had been torn out of the outlet.

It read 7:04 p.m.

The victim was naked from the waist down. She had bruises on her neck. She had been sexually assaulted.

A belt had been used to choke out her final breaths.

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Rivy Lyon
Rivy Lyon

Written by Rivy Lyon

Investigative Journalist | Criminology, psychology & sociology B.A. | I’ve loved true crime since Forensic Files was Medical Detectives!

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