A frantic weekend search for 37-year-old Rachel Morin—who disappeared Saturday evening near the Ma and Pa Trail in Bel Air, Maryland—ended on Sunday afternoon with the discovery of her body near the route.
Now, detectives are trying to find out who may have killed her while Morin’s boyfriend publicly pleads his innocence on social media.
“I love Rachel,” 27-year-old Richard Tobin wrote in a Facebook post. “I would never do anything to her, let the family and I grieve. Yes, I have a past but I also have 15 months clean and have changed as a person. Please.”
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Tobin referenced his lengthy criminal history, which includes charges of assault and resisting arrest, among others. He hasn’t been charged for any offenses since 2020, however.
Just days before she went missing, Tobin had announced his relationship with Morin on Facebook.
But Harford County Sheriff Jeffrey Gahler said there’s still no suspect in Morin’s disappearance and death.
“We firmly believe this is the body of Rachel Morin,” Gahler said at a press conference Sunday night after the discovery of what he said was an “obviously deceased” woman. “But that final determination belongs with the medical examiner and that has not happened yet.”
Gahler said no one was in custody and there was no known motive for the possible homicide.
“Thankfully we don’t have too much violent crime in Harford County, but when we have one, I prefer when I can stand here and tell you that the suspect has been arrested or that it’s a targeted crime,” Gahler said. “I can’t tell you that is the case.”
Gahler added that the Ma and Pa trail will reopen for visitors with a heightened police presence as the investigation continues. He was unable to say that there was no ongoing threat to the community, however.
“I can’t do it,” he said.
Details of the apparent murder remain sparse. Gahler said investigators still weren’t sure exactly when she went missing, saying that she may have disappeared “anytime from 6 p.m.” Saturday until Sunday morning.
Gahler was asked why a homicide investigation had already been started, considering medical examiners weren’t even able to identify the body yet.
“Our detectives have no doubt,” he said. “I’m not going to go into what, physically, they observed at the scene. But investigators believe sadly that it’s a homicide case.”
Cops found Morin’s car at the entrance of the Ma and Pa Trail—a 6.5-mile rail route just south of the Pennsylvania border—hours after Morin’s boyfriend reported her missing late Saturday night.
Bel Air resident Juniper Ernest said she passed Morin on the trail at around 6:45 p.m. on Saturday.
“She was alone and walking past us in the opposite direction,” Ernest told The Daily Beast. “I am assuming she was only a couple minutes into her walk when we passed her.”
Ernest said that the popular trail was relatively barren that day.
“We only passed a handful of people, a few families, a couple bikes, but not a ton of people at all,” she said, adding that she and others in the community “love and enjoy” the Ma and Pa Trail and “always thought it was a safe place to walk.”
Investigators are urging anybody with information to contact the Harford County Sheriff’s Office at 410-836-5430.
