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After Forgiving Her Mother’s Killer, Martha McKay Was Murdered by Him in 2020

Fresh accounts detail recovered evidence, leaving unresolved whether the 2020 killing was a burglary or a planned attack.

Overview

  • In 1996, Sally Snowden McKay and her cousin Joseph “Lee” Baker were killed at the family’s Horseshoe Lake property, and 17-year-old Travis Lewis was convicted.
  • Years later, daughter Martha McKay renovated the home into the Snowden House B&B, supported Lewis’s early release in 2018, and employed him at the property.
  • On March 25, 2020, McKay was found stabbed and bludgeoned at the top of the stairs inside the house.
  • Investigators recovered a cloth bag containing valuables and a bloodied kitchen knife from the scene.
  • Authorities say the suspect fled by jumping from an upstairs window and into the lake, where he drowned; the body was identified as Lewis, and toxicology found multiple drugs, while motive remains undetermined.