Adriane Barker, a former GW international affairs student, was the victim of a vicious murder this winter that kept police searching for her body more than a month after her disappearance.
The 26-year-old Tulsa, Okla., resident was first reported missing Dec. 8, setting off a frenzy in an attempt to find her alive. The Tulsa police finally located Barker’s body Jan. 13; the body was found in the Virdigris River in neighboring Catoosa, Okla.
Officials are unsure how the body ended up wrapped in a rug floating in the cold waters. Douglas Ashworth, the man who admitted to the murder, told the authorities Barker’s body was hidden in the crawl space underneath his house.
Three witnesses told officials that Ashworth shot Barker in the head, prompting his arrest. He later told the police that someone he did not know consequently moved the body, according to his arrest report.
The steps that took Barker to her death were anything but expected. Barker grew up 40 miles outside of Boston before earning a full academic scholarship to GW. She was enrolled as a GW undergraduate student from fall 1998 until the spring 2000 semester, according to the Registrar’s Office.
During her time as a college student, Barker developed borderline schizophrenia and moved to Oklahoma, where her grandparents and father live. During her time there, she reportedly became involved with drugs.
“It’s a shock in a way, but yet we were afraid it was going to be a bad end for her, maybe not an end, but her life certainly wasn’t happy at all,” said her grandfather, Alvin Barker. in an interview with KOTV of Tulsa.
Barker’s mother declined to comment for this story.
Police were following up on one of the many tips they had received about the remains when they found the body.
Ashworth, whom police will only identify as an “associate” of Barker’s, was charged Jan. 3 with kidnapping, unlawful removal of a dead body and first-degree murder. The same night Barker was murdered, the 39-year-old Ashworth also held another woman in his home for two hours before releasing her.
Even though the body had not been located, Barker’s family held a funeral service Dec. 30. Her grandparents said that when the body was recovered, Barker would be buried in Massachusetts. Barker’s daughter lives with her grandmother in Massachusetts.
