Tulsa Police: Children Find Their Mother Dead In SUV

Police are investigating after a woman's children found her body in an SUV parked outside an east Tulsa apartment complex late Friday night.

Saturday, March 21st 2015, 9:07 am

By: Dee Duren

Tulsa Police: Children Find Their Mother Dead In SUV

Detectives are trying to figure out how Michelle Spence ended up dead in the back of her car covered in blankets.

Police are investigating after a woman's children found her body in an SUV parked outside an east Tulsa apartment complex around 11:20 p.m. Friday.

She has been identified as Michelle Spence of Tulsa.

TPD Sgt. Dave Walker told News On 6 the children had been visiting with their father, and and he dropped them off at their mother's residence.

She wasn't home, and the children - ages 10 and 14 - started walking southbound on 129th Street. They knew their mother had friends in an apartment complex but couldn't locate her inside, he said.

They spotted their mother's 2001 Mercedes SUV in the parking lot of the Stone Crest Apartments, 4020 South 130th East Avenue, and found her body.

"It was really sad and really crazy just knowing that and then watching the little kids---the two kids---the two young boys that they had knowing that that was their mom," witness Courtney Courville said.

Detectives are trying to figure out how Spence ended up dead in the back of her car covered in blankets.

"That's basically what we're working here - is a suspicious death of a female 34 years of age, found in the back hatch area of her SUV," Walker said.

Spence had some signs of trauma but no obvious wounds that would cause death, Walker said in a news release sent out late Saturday morning. She did not have a purse or any identification in the SUV.

"There are enough unusual circumstances for the homicide unit to conduct a homicide investigation," he said.

Walker said she had called into work Wednesday and Thursday to say she wasn't coming in, and he believes she was last seen Friday.

The medical examiner will determine cause of death.

"We're going to work it as a homicide until the ME says no," Walker said at the scene.

"It's been a rough night," Courville said. "I mean I haven't slept much knowing that somebody was found dead or murdered out in the parking lot...it's been a tough one."

Police are asking anyone with information on Michelle Spence's death to call Crime Stoppers at 918-596-COPS.