Body found confirmed to be that of missing mother and warrant is issued for violent ex-boyfriend who fled after 'telling relatives he strangled her'
- Construction worker found corpse not far from couple's vacation home
- Cause of death not identified
- Police named boyfriend as a 'person of interest' in the case
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Authorities investigating the death of a mother whose body was found two weeks after she went on a vacation with her children and former partner have issued a warrant for his arrest.
Ohio police confirmed yesterday that a body discovered in a vacant lot on North Carolina's Outer Banks was 33-year-old Lynn Jackenheimer of Ashland.
Nate Summerfield was said to have fled after returning the children and telling his brother he strangled his wife.
The cause of death, which hasn't been released, would determine whether the case is a homicide. Her body was found in a bag by a construction worker about 30 minutes from where she was last seen.
Search: Lynn Jackenheimer, left, went on vacation with her two children and ex-boyfriend Nate Summerfield, right. But he returned without her and told a relative he had strangled her before fleeing
Authorities tell reporters a warrant for Summerfield was issued once the body was identified. He previously was described as a 'person of interest' in the case.
Before the vacation, Lynn Jackenheimer had told family and friends that she was 'hesitant' about taking the trip with her former partner because he had been violent in the past.
After she vanished around two weeks ago, police began to hunt around Hatteras Island in North Carolina, where the pair had been vacationing with her two children.
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ShareOn Saturday a construction worker saw something suspicious and upon investigating realized that it was a dead body.
Alex Taylor, a friend of the missing woman from Ashland, Ohio, told Fox: 'I do know at one point she told Nate she was thinking about not going.
'If I really thought she was in danger, we wouldn’t have let her go.'
Loved: The two children have been devastated by the loss of their mother said their grandfather
Summerfield, 27, returned to Ohio last Sunday to drop off Ms Jackenheimer's 13-year-old daughter and the young boy to their grandparents' homes before fleeing in his car.
His brother Jake immediately called 911 to report 'a possible murder'.
'My brother was in North Carolina with his ex-girlfriend and he came back and said he strangled her. He dropped his kid off and left,' Jake Summerfield told a dispatcher.
He added that he did not know where his brother was going when he sped away in his grey 2009 Honda Civic.
Police were hunting Summerfield using his cell phone signal and when his ATM card was used.
They searched the homes of Ms Jackenheimer and Summerfield for clues.
Lynn Jackenheimer, with her three-year-old son and 13-year-old daughter
Warrant issued: Summerfield, left, posted a picture on Facebook of him with the children on vacation shortly before he left them with relatives and fled
Ms Jackenheimer had been staying in a vacation rental home on the island with Summerfield and her children, but authorities found no clues as to her whereabouts at the home.
'We found nothing to date that they sent us to look for,' Dare County Sheriff's Department Chief Deputy Steve Hoggard.
The children remain with relatives in Ohio. Both had been questioned by police but could offer little evidence about what had happened to their mother.
Lynn's stepfather, Raymond Johnson, told WOIO that Ms Jackenheimer's 13-year-old daughter, who has special needs, was left at his home in Dorchester, Ohio.
'She was all by herself when we found her,' Mr Johnson said. 'He left her in the house took the little boy to his parents' house.
'They mainly cry for their mom, that's what they are doing. We are hoping for the best that's all.'
Friends and relatives of the missing woman held a candlelight vigil on Monday at Goodfellows Pizzeria and Sports Pub in Ashland, where she works as a bartender.
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