SCOTT CITY MAN ACCUSED IN ILLINOIS SLAYING; SUSPECT BELIEVED TO HAVE DISMEMBERED BODY

PERU, Ill. -- A Scott City, Mo., man faces multiple charges in connection with the death of a woman and the dismemberment of her body in a motel room where he had lived while working on a pipeline in northern Illinois.

Richard G. Meyer, 42, faces two counts of first-degree murder, one count of concealing a homicide and one count of criminal damage to property in connection with the July 11 death of Ernestina M. Hinojosa, 43, of Kennewick, Wash.

Meyer is accused of stabbing Hinojosa to death in the Peru, Ill., hotel room where he had lived since going to work in the region.

A warrant for criminal damage to property was issued July 12 after employees at the EconLodge summoned police to the room that was registered to Meyer. Motel staff had entered the room to investigate blood dripping from the ceiling beneath his second-floor room.

Motel staff told police Meyer had indicated to them that he had spilled Kool-Aid on the carpet.

In the room police found a large amount of blood and a bloody hacksaw and knife. Police also found a woman's dress with holes consistent with knife wounds.

Investigators had little information besides the motel room evidence until Monday, when police in Rock Island, Ill., found Meyer lying on a sidewalk in a residential neighborhood with facial injuries. A routine check for warrants was conducted, and Rock Island police arrested Meyer on the criminal damage warrant.

After being taken to La Salle County Jail, Meyer indicated "that he had stabbed a woman ... and later dismembered her," said La Salle County State's Attorney Michael James.

Police said Meyer told of dismembering Hinojosa's body, putting parts into three coolers and dumping them. Police said he led them to where the body had been dumped in a cornfield northwest of nearby Ottawa, Ill. The site was some five minutes from the motel and near a pipeline trench where he had previously worked.

Security cameras at the Peru Wal-Mart showed Meyer purchasing a cooler, hacksaw and cleaning supplies shortly after the store had opened the morning of July 12. Family members said he had purchased a hunting knife a week earlier for a planned camping trip.

La Salle County Coroner Jody Bernard said the body, which has been tentatively identified as Hinojosa's, had been beheaded. Bernard said she is awaiting arrival of dental records from Washington to make a final identification.

"It's theoretically possible the body could not have been found until the fall when harvesting begins and a skeleton was found," said Peru Police Chief Glenn Fredrickson.

Fredrickson said it was unknown why Hinojosa was in Peru. He referred to her as Meyer's "lady friend." Investigators believe she had met Meyer shortly before her death. She was staying at a nearby hotel.

The woman apparently had come to Illinois looking for construction work to support her youngest child.

"She went looking for a job so she could bring money back home to support my little sister," said Marcy Ortega, 24, the eldest daughter of Ernestina Hinojosa.