Margaret Peggy Lammers Murder in Deltaville, Virginia, Most Likely Done By Someone She Knew, Police Say

On the morning of July 11, 2017, Anne Ferguson called her sister, Margaret “Peggy” Lammers, who was resting and relaxing at their family’s riverside cottage in Deltaville, Virginia. A 61-year-old living in Cleveland, Ohio with her husband, Lammers spent more than a year in her hometown caring for her ailing father, and when he passed away, settled her business in nearby Richmond, where she grow up.

Lammers was alone for the weekend at the summer mansion her parents built in 1970, Ferguson told The Daily Beast.

Ferguson said: “I haven’t heard from her and I think it’s strange that her phone goes straight to voicemail. “I tried again about an hour later and she didn’t pick up. I assume her phone is not charged and has been turned off.”

Ferguson said Lammers and her relatives have always kept in close contact with each other. At 5:30 p.m., Lammers’ husband Tony called her to ask if his wife was coming with her because he couldn’t get a hold of her, Ferguson said. Lammers’ eldest daughter, AJ, who talks to her mother every day when she leaves work, is also unable to contact her.

“Her husband asked if Peggy would come with me,” Ferguson said. “I told him no and I was expecting her anytime. He then called the Middlesex County Sheriff’s Office to conduct a welfare check.”

That night, a detective walked through the slightly open glass door of the motel. Lammers’ body lay in the hallway covered in blood. She died of “forceful trauma”, according to one news launched by the FBI, which is assisting the Middlesex Sheriff’s Office in the murder investigation.

Sheriff Middlesex’s Det. Chris Gatling is the current homicide investigator who is combining the evidence found at the crime scene that could lead to Lammers’ murder.

“It’s fair to say we have a theory, but I’m not going to reveal that,” Gatling told The Daily Beast. “A question has been developed, but it takes time to disprove or prove it. I don’t believe at this point, that [whoever committed the murder] is a stranger. “

Five years after the murder, Ferguson was the only family member to have passed through the house since Lammers was beaten to death. The brutal murder left her family reeling. “I haven’t been back since she was killed,” her 39-year-old son Jay Lammers told The Daily Beast. “It was tragic for me. I miss her every day. I’m heartbroken that she’s gone.”

Mr Lammers, his sister, eldest brother Jack Thornton and their parents are a close-knit family, spending summers and weekends at the cottage, which offers panoramic views of the Piankatank River flowing into the Chesapeake Bay, Ferguson said. Ferguson said: “Peggy always likes to go to the river. “We would all go to the river together to fish and catch crabs and do things like that.”

Their father, Marine Corps veteran and physician John Thornton, helped found Physicians Clinical Laboratories that merged with another company to become LabCorp, according to him. obituary.

In 1987, Lammers married and moved to Cleveland with her husband, Tony. In addition to Jay and AJ, the couple also has a third child, daughter Presley. Her son recalls that the Lammers also spent some quality time in the cottage.

Illustration by Luis G. Rendon / The Daily Beast / Getty / FBI

“We grew up there, spending the summer fishing, boating, swimming and biking,” says Jay Lammers. “We just enjoy each other’s company. So are my sisters.”

He credits his mother for giving him a needless sense of humor and for showing him how to live with empathy and concern for others. Jay Lammers said: “We laugh at each other when we talk. “She cares deeply for others, constantly putting their needs above her own, especially her family and children.”

Ferguson said that in 2016, a year after their mother’s death, Lammers went to Richmond to take care of their then 89-year-old father, who suffered from anemia and a weakened immune system. Mrs Lammers has time to look after him because all of her children are grown up and live separately, Ferguson added.

“She was with him 24/7 until his death in November of that year,” she said. “At that time, my children were 12 and 14 years old. He cannot be around animals or children because he is prone to infections. The only people who could go to him were my sister, my brother and me. We put masks around him. It’s like COVID before COVID”.

On Saturday, July 8, 2017, Lammers drove from her sister’s home in Richmond to the family’s cottage, which is on Stove Point, a tree-lined one-lane road. It is the only entrance and exit.

“We spoke several times on Saturday, Sunday and Monday, which was our brother’s birthday,” Ferguson said. “We last spoke at 6 p.m. on July 10. She was going back to Richmond that day, but she decided to stay another night.”

In 2020, the FBI released a short video that gave viewers a tour of the crime scene at the cottage the family had abandoned since Lammers was murdered. A little over three minutes long, the clip includes a chyron that says, “while it looks like someone broke in, investigators believe the scene was staged.” The camera points to a broken telescope lying on the floor near a sliding glass door, a knife perfectly placed in the middle of the kitchen sink, an unfinished mosaic on the table and a bathroom sink filled with toiletries.

The clip ends with Jay Lammers’ voiceover: “I couldn’t get away from the fact that I thought it was someone who knew my mother.”

Det. Gatling declined to comment on the crime scene: “I have to protect the integrity of the case and the evidence.”

Ferguson and Jay Lammers said authorities told them the crime scene was staged to look like a burglary. His mother was very concerned about telling him and his sisters to always be aware of their surroundings and not give people a reason to harm them, Jay Lammers added.

“It’s hard to think it was just some random act,” Jay Lammers said. “Unfortunately, I felt that it was probably someone who knew her and she didn’t blink to let them in until it was too late.”

Ferguson said Gatling assured her that the sheriff’s office had evidence that he couldn’t talk about it with the suspect. “The fact that she was killed in the hallway showed me that the person knew her and knew the house,” Ferguson said. “It’s unbelievable that someone can get in and out without anyone seeing anything.”

Half a decade later, Jay Lammers says he’s not sure if he, his father and his sisters will be able to return to the cottage or find solace. “Still no closure, still no peace and still no justice,” he said. “Not knowing what happened every day is a terrible place. I wouldn’t wish that in anyone else. “