Sheri Jo Elliot

On November 20th, 1983, Sheri Jo Elliot’s body was found in a drainage ditch on the Muller Road, in Blumfield Township, Michigan. Though she had not been seen since November 16th, the autopsy determined that she had probably been alive until probably November 19th and concluded that she had died from exsanguination. She had been shot 4 times and sexually assaulted. Additionally, she suffered multiple fractures to her osseous system as well as lacerations to the skin and brain.  

 

Sheri Jo Elliot was a 16-year-old who attended Carman High School and worked part time as a babysitter. Sheri was described as shy and intelligent. She was always careful around strangers. Sheri Jo had just moved to the Flint area to live with her mom after living with her father in Charlotte.

 

The Michigan State Police Third District Cold Case Team had reopened the case multiple times since 1983. Almost 42 years after her death, due to advances in DNA testing, detectives were able to reexamine evidence in the case collected from Sheri Jo's body. Working in partnership with the MSP Forensic Science Division and Othram Labs, investigators utilized Forensic-Grade Genome Sequencing to develop a profile of an unidentified suspect.  This work led detectives to focus on Roni Collins, of Grand Blanc.

Their investigation was assisted by students from the WMU Cold Case Program starting in 2023.

The new DNA testing results identified 75-year-old Roni Collins from Grand Blanc.  Roni had previously lived in the same town as Sheri Jo was a traveling musician in the area during the time she was murdered. He would have been about 33 years old at the time he murdered Elliot. Students from WMU were about the same age as Sheri Jo at the time of her death.

Before investigators could obtain a voluntary DNA sample, Collins died by suicide in January 2026. DNA collected during his autopsy was later analyzed, and conclusively matched evidence recovered from Elliot in 1983, identifying him as the individual responsible for the crime.

 

In January 2026, Roni Collins committed suicide before he could be charged with the murder and sexual assault of Sheri Jo Elliot. But the DNA collected during his autopsy matched the DNA found on Elliot in 1983.

MSP's news release on April 13, 2026 said:  "Western Michigan University Cold Case Program students were integral to solving this case. The students assisted in reorganizing and digitizing decades of investigative material, providing critical support to the renewed investigation."  Students had intense confidentiality training and were vetted by MSP before being allowed to see any of the case files. They learned about the DNA match in the case about two months before the information was released publicly.