Woman’s body found 20 years after husband killed her and hid body, Georgia jury finds
Thirty years after the disappearance of his wife, a Georgia man was found guilty of murdering her and concealing her death, authorities say.
Kevin James Lee was sentenced to life in prison with the possibility of parole – “the only allowable sentence under the law that applied at the time the crime was committed,” according to the District Attorney’s Office of the Coweta Judicial Circuit.
Ann Margaret Berry was reported missing by her sister after she disappeared in 1991.
Her body wasn’t found until 20 years later, in 2011. Her husband, Lee, was charged with her death shortly after, according to the release. But it took another 10 years for Lee to finally face a jury.
A ‘tumultuous’ marriage
The mystery surrounding Berry’s disappearance began in 1991.
In the spring of 1991, Berry was pregnant with her third child and “seemed very excited about it,” District Attorney John Herbert Cranford said in a news release.
But friends and family described the relationship between Berry and Lee as “tumultuous” and said that Lee was often physically violent with the woman.
“The victim’s family saw bruises and marks on the victim’s body and face, and saw holes in the walls of the home where the victim had been thrown into the walls,” Cranford said in the release.
On July 4, 1991, authorities say Berry called her sister asking if she and her children could move in with her as she could no longer endure the abuse. The sister received a similar call on July 31, 1991 when Berry told her she was packing and would drive to her sister’s house shortly.
Berry never made it to her sister’s home and was never heard from again, the district attorney said.
When the sister asked Lee about Berry, the defendant said that she had left with her boyfriend. Within a week, Lee took the children and moved to Kansas, according to the release. He never filed a police report.
“When the victim’s sister went to the home to clean it out, she found the victim’s clothing, jewelry, makeup and other personal effects still in the residence,” the district attorney said.
The sister filed a missing person’s report in 1991 and 1997, but for years, there was no development in the case.
Until 2011, when two boys were camping in the woods – less than 100 yards behind Berry’s home, according to the release.
“As they dug a fire pit, they came across a buried plastic bag containing skeletal remains,” the release said.
Remains identified
Authorities were able to identify the remains as Berry.
CCSO Major John Lewis started an investigation and, 20 years after Berry’s disappearance, he obtained a warrant against Lee for murder and concealing the death of another.
In 2018, Lee was arrested after he was found living in California. He was extradited to Coweta County in 2019.
Thirty years after her murder, on March 7, 2022, the case was finally brought to trial in the Superior Court of Coweta County.
After two days of trial, it took the jury about an hour to reach a verdict. They found Lee guilty on both counts.
In the release, Cranford conveyed “his immense respect for the victim’s sister, who never stopped looking for her and who fought for justice for 30 years. Without her, this case would not have resulted in a guilty verdict.”
“She was an amazing woman, loved her kids. I always babysat for her, she was my best friend,” one commenter said on a Facebook post about the news. “And it was so hard when I found out what he had done to her. But now Ann is at (rest) and peace.”
This story was originally published March 14, 2022 at 4:39 PM with the headline "Woman’s body found 20 years after husband killed her and hid body, Georgia jury finds."
