Authorities in Michigan are investigating whether five deaths involving men along a Lansing trail could be connected, raising concerns that a potential serial killer may be at large.
“One question that we are being asked is, ‘Do we have a serial killer in Lansing?’” Police Chief Robert Backus said during a recent press conference. “What we need the public to know is that we are investigating all of these cases. They are all active investigations, and we are looking at the idea, or the possibility, that these may be related cases.”
The victims were white men ranging in age from 22 to 70 who authorities believe were homeless. They were discovered with severe injuries along a roughly one-mile section of the Lansing River Trail between October 2025 and August 2026. Investigators believe the attacks or incidents took place overnight or during the early morning.
Backus said one man had been stabbed, while the others appeared to have suffered blunt-force trauma and serious injuries to the face.
“We believe that our victims in this case were lying down, potentially even sleeping,” Backus said. “We don’t know that but based on how we found our victims and their surroundings, it would lead us to believe that this could be a pattern.”
The first victim was 54-year-old Gino Chouinard, who was found along the trail with facial injuries on Oct. 14, 2025. He died at a hospital on Oct. 27. The medical examiner later determined that his cause of death was undetermined.
On July 9, 70-year-old Denis Dunnebacke was found unresponsive beneath the Kalamazoo Street Bridge. “He was breathing, but he was also covered in vomit,” Backus said, adding that Dunnebacke had “apparent facial injuries.”
Dunnebacke died on July 16, and the medical examiner had not issued a finding, according to Backus. The chief said “conflicting information” initially raised the possibility that Dunnebacke’s injuries resulted from a medical emergency rather than a criminal act.
“When we have unknown instances, where we don’t know the cause of injuries, we treat these as suspicious situations,” Backus said. “We investigated this as a serious assault.”
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Three days after Dunnebacke was found, police discovered 57-year-old Robert Smith unresponsive and bleeding from the head. His death was later ruled a homicide.
“We recognized, immediately, that from that location and some of the common factors,” Backus said, “that this was very similar to Mr. Chouinard’s death.”
The fourth victim, 22-year-old Daniel Lusk, was found stabbed to death beneath the Michigan Avenue Bridge on Aug. 20.
“As the investigation moved forward in this incident, we did develop a suspect,” Backus said. “That suspect in this case is 23-year-old Edward Smith and our prosecutor’s office issued charges for open murder.”
Smith’s attorney did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Oxygen, and it remains unclear whether Smith has entered a plea. Police have not identified him as a suspect in the other cases.
The fifth victim, 57-year-old Louis Woodruff, was found beneath a bridge on Aug. 30 with facial injuries. His death, like those of Smith and the other victims, was classified as a homicide.
Backus stressed that the incidents were “isolated” and occurred during the early morning hours. “I do not have concerns [about] safety on the River Trail outside of those hours,” he said.
A Lansing Police Department spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Oxygen.