Investigators have discovered the body of Mackenzie Lueck, the 23-year-old El Segundo, Calif., woman who was presumed dead after she was reported missing in Salt Lake City last month.
Authorities had initially believed that the man arrested in connection with Lueck's death, 31-year-old Ayoola Ajayi, had burned her body in the backyard of his suburban Salt Lake City home. Ajayi was taken into custody June 28 and has not yet been formally charged in connection with the crime.
At a news conference Friday afternoon, Salt Lake City Police Chief Mike Brown said that investigators recovered Lueck's body Wednesday in Logan Canyon, about 85 miles north of Salt Lake City. Forensic tests confirmed her identity, he said.
Lueck, a pre-nursing student at the University of Utah, went missing June 17 after arriving at the Salt Lake City airport following her grandmother's funeral in Los Angeles.
Records show that the last person she communicated with using her cellphone was Ajayi, authorities said. Investigators then searched his home and found a freshly dug area along with human tissue belonging to a woman and some of Lueck's personal items that had been charred, police said.
Ajayi was booked into jail on suspicion of aggravated murder, kidnapping, obstruction of justice and desecration of a body.
Salt Lake County District Attorney Sim Gill said Friday that his office was working to review charges against Ajayi, and that they were expected to be formally filed early next week.
It's still not known when or how Lueck was killed, and police have not provided a possible motive for the slaying.
