Police find leads in case of missing woman

Three years ago, Lorraine Kirkley was reported missing.\nThree years later, her body has yet to be found.\nThe then 34-year-old Valparaiso, Ind. nurse was believed to have been abducted and murdered by now 36-year-old David Malinski from Chesterton, Ind. on July 21, 1999. A jury found him guilty and sentenced him to 155 years in prison. He is currently detained in the Indiana State Prison in Michigan City, Ind.\nInvestigations continued Tuesday, as police believe her body is buried within a five-mile radius of Malinski's home. It is there where authorities believe Kirkley was taken, beaten and killed.\nCadaver-sniffing canines from Illinois, trained to track down decomposition, were brought into the Chesterton area to search for the missing woman's body -- but the search turned up the case's usual results -- nothing.\n"Everything that possibly could have been done has been done," Porter County Police Capt. Mike Jenkins told The Munster Times. "This is going to be it. The case is going to be inactive. But we will still accept leads and evaluate them if they come in." \nAreas near Malinski's house that had never been searched before were scanned by the dogs brought in to help Porter County police. \nKirkley disappeared from her home in rural Valparaiso on Wednesday, July 21, along with her green 1994 Ford Explorer. The car, which had been set on fire, was found in a LaPorte County cornfield four days later.\nAfter returning home from her job as a cardiac rehabilitation nurse at the Northwest Indiana Heart Center, court documents reveal that Kirkley's home was burglarized. After the burglary, she was killed because, according to court documents, she recognized the perpetrator -- he worked with her at Porter Memorial Hospital.\nTwo days following the incident, Porter County police received a plastic bag that was found at Chandana Point in Valparaiso. The bag held the keys to Kirkley's missing vehicle and an anonymous note to her husband that described the events leading up to the disappearance and why she had disappeared.\nAccording to court documents, the author of the letter said "he killed Lorraine Kirkley because she recognized him during the July 21 burglary. The author further described Lorraine biting his right middle finger during the confrontation." \nFour days following the discovery of the note, Malinski's wife, Kelley, called into Porter County police to turn in her husband. He was taken into custody shortly thereafter where authorities found a bite mark on his middle finger. \nWithout police mentioning the evidence, court documents state Malinski initiated conversation concerning the plastic bag and its contents. He admitted to having written the note along with being responsible for blood found in his home as well as in Kirkley's home.\nThough Malinski admitted to writing the note, he holds that he is not responsible for Kirkley's abduction or murder. He held to a plea of 'not guilty' in front of Porter Superior Judge Roger Bradford.\nBut despite his adamant denial of murder, Malinski reportedly told a fellow inmate that he hid photographs of the woman along a county road. The information was reported to authorities, and the photos -- containing graphic images of the nurse being handcuffed, gagged and sexually assaulted -- were found.\nMalinski and his wife have since been divorced, and now, in jail for the next 155 years, he vows to hold out until the appeal of his murder, which is pending in 15 months. \nHe maintains that Kirkley vanished to avoid the pangs of an unhappy life.\nKirkley's husband, Robert, has since sold their Valparaiso home and moved to South Bend. He was quoted in The Munster Times as having said in a statement in Porter Superior Court, "Personally, I have been destroyed down to my foundation. Were it not for my faith, I would have given up long ago. He buried her in an unmarked grave like an animal. I know of no punishment in our legal system that is severe enough. That will have to be left to the perfect judge we will all face when we leave this life."\nThe Munster Times contributed to this story.