Linda McCord

• Missing Since 04/03/1987
• Missing From Orangeburg County, South Carolina
• Classification Endangered Missing
• Sex Female
• Race Black
• Date of Birth 08/12/1954 (71)
• Age 31 years old
• Associated Vehicle(s) Blue 1977 Lincoln (accounted for)
• Distinguishing Characteristics African-American female. Black hair, brown eyes. Linda may wear eyeglasses.

Details of Disappearance

Linda was last seen with a friend, Sarah Boyd, and Sarah's daughter, Kimberly. The three of them attended a gospel concert in Waltersboro, South Carolina on the evening of April 3, 1987. They were driving through Dorchester County, South Carolina en route to their residences in Orangeburg County when they disappeared.

A witness saw Linda's blue 1977 Lincoln driving between 30 and 45 miles per hour around Route 15. Another car was behind it, but the witness was unable to describe the second vehicle or its occupant(s).

Sarah's husband, Phillip J. Boyd, returned home from work at midnight. He was initially unconcerned about his wife and daughter's absence because he thought they were with other relatives or with McCord. When Sarah and Kimberly hadn't returned by 6:00 a.m. the next day, Phillip notified the police.

The vehicle in which the Boyds and Linda were traveling was located disabled and abandoned in Dorchester County near the intersection of Highway 15 and 176 on April 5. Linda's husband, John McCord, found it. A freeze plug had blown out and the engine had overheated. There was no sign of the three females at the scene and they have never been heard from again. A photo of their car is posted with this case summary.

Sarah's credit card was used in a local mall in 1990, three years after her disappearance. Police stated the signature was barely legible and didn't match Sarah's writing. The identity of the credit card user has never been established.

One possible suspect in the disappearances is John. According to Linda's family, he scratched out the faces of her high school dates in photographs she had kept, and there was domestic violence in their relationship: he had beaten her, pulled her hair out and threatened her with a gun. He also had a history of tampering with her vehicle.

Linda's mother died two years after her daughter disappeared. At 11:00 p.m. on the night Linda went missing, John and his nephew came to her home extremely sweaty and covered with dirt and with their boots muddy. She didn't think anything of it at the time because John did construction work. She never told the police about this prior to her death, or told them about the problems in John and Linda's marriage, because she was afraid of John. She did tell others in the family, however.

John told police he spent that day at his construction job, then went out drinking at the local Piggly Wiggly, then went to Linda's mother's house at 11:00 p.m., which matches Linda's story. He said that he started looking for Linda after midnight and searched for her all night and didn't return home until 5:00 a.m.

The police said John cooperated with the investigation and answered all their questions until they asked him to take a polygraph, after which point he stopped cooperating. He claimed he didn't trust them because he had once taken a polygraph on an unrelated matter and the results showed he was lying when he was not lying. John died in 2018 and was never charged in his wife or the Boyds' disappearances.

Both John and Sarah's husband Phillip worked at Giant Cement Company in Harleyville, South Carolina when the disappearances happened, and investigators searched the grounds of the company for evidence in the case but found nothing. Phillip took a polygraph about his wife and daughter's disappearances and the results said he lied in response to one question, which was about whether or not he was having an affair. Sarah and Kimberly's family doesn't believe he was involved in the disappearances, however.

Phillip had his wife and daughter declared legally dead three years after they went missing. He has since moved out of the area and remarried, but he continues to keep in touch with the police investigating the case.

In 2020, investigators got a tip that the three missing females were buried under concrete at a house in Santee, South Carolina; John had poured that concrete. The current owner of the home was in the middle of a renovation and allowed the police to tear the entire house down to look for the bodies. They found nothing.

Foul play is suspected in Linda and the Boyds' disappearances.