After nearly 55 years, investigators have finally identified the woman long known as “Little Miss Lake Panasoffkee,” one of Florida’s most haunting cold cases.
Authorities confirmed the victim as Maureen L. “Cookie” Minor Rowan, a 21-year-old mother of two who was found dead in February 1971 beneath a bridge at Lake Panasoffkee in Sumter County.
Rowan’s body was discovered under the Lake Panasoffkee Bridge near Interstate 75, with evidence suggesting she had been strangled. For decades, despite repeated forensic efforts, her identity remained a mystery.
The breakthrough came when investigators used the state’s advanced fingerprint system (STORM) to compare old prints from the 1971 investigation with more recent state records. The fingerprints matched those of Rowan, whose 1970 arrest record for passing a bad check had only been digitized in 2013.
Officials say Rowan was living separately from her husband, Charles “Emery” Rowan Sr., around the time of her death. He has been named a person of interest in the case but died in 2015.
Detectives are now working to piece together Rowan’s final movements in 1971, tracing her connections to areas including Tampa, Jacksonville, and Enigma, Georgia.
“This case has weighed heavily on our community for decades,” said Capt. Jon Galvin of the Sumter County Sheriff’s Office. “Now that she has a name, we hope her family and the public can finally find some closure.”
Anyone with information about Maureen “Cookie” Rowan or her husband is urged to contact the Sumter County Sheriff’s Office at 352-569-1915, email sumtertips@sumtercountysheriff.org
, or remain anonymous through Crimeline at 1-800-423-TIPS (8477).
The case remains under active investigation