Aug 25, 2026 · 32 min · 15 segments
When a young man’s body is found in a picnic pavilion in Tulsa’s Mohawk Park stripped of clothing and belongings, law enforcement is left with many questions. But within a matter of weeks, clues begin…
She was planning to have that event later in the day, so her early arrival was on purpose.
She wanted to ensure that her group would have first dibs at one of the park's enclosed picnic pavilions near some boat docks.
But shortly after going inside the pavilion she had her eye on, she saw something horrible.
Lying on top of a quilt blanket on the ground was the bloodied nude body of a young man.
He was dead, and Grace saw that his arms had been spread apart and his head had been severely beaten.
She immediately reported what she'd found, and in short order, an investigation got underway.
From the outset, the scene was treated as a homicide, and detectives quickly located some additional items of evidence that they suspected belonged to the victim or were likely related to the case.
There was a pair of underwear and two shoes sitting nearby that had socks tucked inside them.
There was also a folded T-shirt on top of a table about 12 to 15 feet away that authorities strongly suspected belonged to their victim.
So police scoured the area for those things as well as anything that might have been used as a possible murder weapon, but they came up empty-handed.
It's hard to tell from reading the available source material exactly how authorities made this next leap, but by some means, they managed to positively ID the victim as 20-year-old David Perry Lewellen, a Tulsa County resident who worked for a saw blade manufacturer in the city but who lived in a northeast suburb called Owasso.
Again, it's unclear to me how detectives figured out who David was since his wallet was said to be missing, but somehow they did.
Anyway, by two o'clock that afternoon, an autopsy was conducted, and the pathologist who examined David determined that he'd died as a result of ligature strangulation and blunt force trauma to his head.
In the pathologist's report, he noted that David had likely been strangled with a small rope or cord as well as repeatedly beaten in the head with a blunt object, possibly a rock.
Initial news coverage by Tulsa World stated that David's estimated time of death was determined to be between 2:00 and 3:00 in the morning on the 27th.
However, later information produced in court records estimated that David could have been killed as early as 8:00 PM on the 26th or as late as 4:00 AM on the 27th.
However, later information produced in court records estimated that David could have been killed as early as 8:00 PM on the 26th or as late as 4:00 AM on the 27th.
She was planning to have that event later in the day, so her early arrival was on purpose.
She wanted to ensure that her group would have first dibs at one of the park's enclosed picnic pavilions near some boat docks.
But shortly after going inside the pavilion she had her eye on, she saw something horrible.
Lying on top of a quilt blanket on the ground was the bloodied nude body of a young man.
He was dead, and Grace saw that his arms had been spread apart and his head had been severely beaten.
She immediately reported what she'd found, and in short order, an investigation got underway.
From the outset, the scene was treated as a homicide, and detectives quickly located some additional items of evidence that they suspected belonged to the victim or were likely related to the case.
There was a pair of underwear and two shoes sitting nearby that had socks tucked inside them.
There was also a folded T-shirt on top of a table about 12 to 15 feet away that authorities strongly suspected belonged to their victim.
So police scoured the area for those things as well as anything that might have been used as a possible murder weapon, but they came up empty-handed.
It's hard to tell from reading the available source material exactly how authorities made this next leap, but by some means, they managed to positively ID the victim as 20-year-old David Perry Lewellen, a Tulsa County resident who worked for a saw blade manufacturer in the city but who lived in a northeast suburb called Owasso.
Again, it's unclear to me how detectives figured out who David was since his wallet was said to be missing, but somehow they did.
Anyway, by two o'clock that afternoon, an autopsy was conducted, and the pathologist who examined David determined that he'd died as a result of ligature strangulation and blunt force trauma to his head.
In the pathologist's report, he noted that David had likely been strangled with a small rope or cord as well as repeatedly beaten in the head with a blunt object, possibly a rock.
Initial news coverage by Tulsa World stated that David's estimated time of death was determined to be between 2:00 and 3:00 in the morning on the 27th.
However, later information produced in court records estimated that David could have been killed as early as 8:00 PM on the 26th or as late as 4:00 AM on the 27th.
However, later information produced in court records estimated that David could have been killed as early as 8:00 PM on the 26th or as late as 4:00 AM on the 27th.
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