The woman expected to buy supplies for the couple’s child before authorities said Logan Willis drove her toward an isolated area.
RIPLEY, W.Va. — A routine arrangement between estranged parents was supposed to include a Walmart trip for their child’s weekend supplies. Authorities say the shopping trip never happened, and the woman instead ended up unconscious in a wooded area after an attack that eventually sent Logan Willis to prison.
Willis, 22, of Oak Hill, was sentenced July 28 to eight to 36 years after pleading guilty to attempted murder, two counts of malicious assault and one count of domestic battery. Fifth Circuit Judge Lora Dyer ordered the sentences to run consecutively in Jackson County Circuit Court. Local reporting described the combined term as the maximum available under the plea arrangement. Willis must serve the minimum eight years before he can become eligible for parole.
The origins of the case were tied closely to the former couple’s shared child. Jackson County Sheriff Ross Mellinger said Willis and the woman had arranged a June 6, 2025, custody exchange so Willis could have the child for the weekend. The woman got into Willis’ vehicle with the understanding that they would first travel to Walmart and buy items the child needed, according to the sheriff. The expected errand gave an ordinary purpose to the trip between two people whose romantic relationship had ended.
Mellinger later said investigators concluded that Willis did not genuinely intend to take the woman shopping. The sheriff said he believed the proposed trip was used to persuade her to enter the vehicle before Willis drove toward a more isolated location near Kenna. Because the prosecution ended in guilty pleas instead of a trial, that account of advance planning was never put before jurors for a separate factual finding. Willis admitted the criminal offenses resolved by his pleas, while the sheriff’s broader interpretation of his planning remains an attributed investigative conclusion.
Authorities said that after reaching the rural area, Willis repeatedly assaulted the woman and strangled her until she became unconscious. The criminal complaint said Willis indicated that the attack continued until she stopped breathing. Officials said he then dragged her into a wooded area and left because he thought she had died. Public reports described numerous serious injuries but did not provide a detailed medical inventory, and later coverage has generally summarized the violence in restrained terms.
The woman was in the late stages of pregnancy. She eventually regained consciousness in the wooded area and made her way toward a road, according to investigators. Passing motorists began noticing her and calling Jackson County 911. One person stopped to help. Emergency recordings released later showed dispatchers trying to establish her location, send medical responders and address her fear that her attacker could return. The woman told the person assisting her that she was pregnant.
The danger she feared had already shifted elsewhere. Willis had driven to a gas station in the Kenna area and called 911. Their young child was with him, according to authorities. Willis told a dispatcher that he believed he had killed the child’s mother during an altercation. In the recording, he described an argument involving his relationship with their son and acknowledged hitting the woman. A dispatcher kept Willis on the telephone until a deputy could reach the gas station.
That meant the custody exchange that began the day’s events also remained present at the time Willis surrendered. The child whose weekend needs were supposed to be the reason for the Walmart trip was with Willis when he contacted emergency services. Authorities have not publicly identified the child, and reports have appropriately kept details about the minor limited. The child’s presence was relevant to the response because deputies had to take Willis into custody while ensuring the child was safe and other responders were racing toward the injured woman.
Mellinger said deputies effectively had two active scenes. One involved Willis waiting for police. The other involved the woman who had survived and reached Pigeon Roost Road. Investigators then worked backward from both locations to the place where the assault occurred. The woman’s survival gave them a living victim from whom information could be obtained, while Willis’ own statements supplied a separate account of the confrontation. Physical evidence from the rural location could then be considered alongside those accounts.
The woman was transported to CAMC General Hospital in Charleston in what early reports described as very critical condition. Mellinger said authorities were concerned about both her health and her pregnancy. Public reporting later indicated that she was recovering, but detailed medical information has not been released. The sentencing coverage reviewed for this article did not provide a verified update on the outcome of the pregnancy, so that information remains outside the confirmed public record.
Willis was taken into custody and initially faced charges described in news coverage as attempted murder, malicious assault and strangulation. A magistrate set his bond at $500,000. On July 1, 2025, Willis waived a preliminary hearing before Jackson County Magistrate Laura Pursley. The waiver meant prosecutors did not have to present their evidence at a contested preliminary hearing to establish probable cause at that stage. The Jackson County Prosecutor’s Office opposed reducing his bond as the felony prosecution continued.
The final case differed somewhat from the earliest description of the charges. Willis ultimately pleaded guilty to attempted murder, two malicious-assault counts and domestic battery. Those convictions are the controlling legal outcome. Early charge descriptions reflect the case as it existed immediately after the attack, while the guilty pleas identify the crimes for which Willis was formally convicted and sentenced. No jury trial was necessary once the court accepted those pleas.
The absence of a trial also means the public record does not include the full adversarial testing that would ordinarily occur before jurors. Prosecutors did not have to call witnesses in sequence, introduce every piece of physical evidence or establish their theory of how the Walmart plan developed. Defense attorneys likewise did not have to challenge those witnesses before a jury. The guilty pleas resolved the criminal liability questions that mattered for judgment while leaving some details of the investigation known only through court documents and statements from officials.
Dyer’s sentencing decision made the individual terms consecutive rather than concurrent. The resulting eight-to-36-year prison term means Willis must serve the lower end before becoming eligible for parole. Eligibility is only the first point at which release may be considered and is not a promise that it will occur. The maximum 36-year figure marks the upper end of the prison sentence imposed in the case.
The woman spoke at the sentencing hearing before Dyer announced the sentence. News organizations characterized her victim-impact statement as emotional but did not publish a complete transcript that could be independently verified. Her precise words are therefore omitted. Her participation brought the case back to the person who had entered the vehicle believing she was taking part in an errand connected to her child’s stay with Willis.
That starting point separates the case from an unexplained meeting at an isolated location. According to Mellinger, the woman did not agree to travel into the woods or expect an unusual encounter. She believed she was participating in a parenting-related trip to purchase necessary items. Investigators said the destination changed only after she was already in Willis’ vehicle. That sequence became one of the most prominent facts publicly cited by the sheriff when explaining why investigators regarded the attack as more than a spontaneous argument.
At the same time, the guilty plea means the story’s legal focus is no longer whether Willis committed the four offenses for which he was convicted. The remaining distinctions concern which additional details were investigative conclusions, which were documented in the criminal complaint and which were expressly admitted in court. Maintaining those distinctions is important because no jury issued a detailed verdict describing every step of the encounter.
The public record also remains limited concerning the woman’s life after the attack. Her identity has not been central to most reporting, and detailed medical information has not been widely published. Later coverage has focused instead on Willis’ guilty pleas and sentence. That approach leaves some of the most personal consequences outside public view while preserving the established legal outcome.
No jury ultimately heard prosecutors test the sheriff’s belief that the planned Walmart trip was a pretext to get the woman into Willis’ vehicle. Willis’ guilty pleas resolved the charged crimes before a trial could examine every detail of that alleged planning. The ordinary custody exchange that began the encounter therefore remains one of the case’s most consequential facts — and one whose full evidentiary record never had to be presented in open court.
Author note: Last updated September 8, 2026.