Dermond Murder At Lake Oconee Still Unsolved

Ten years have ticked by since the double murder of an elderly couple, Russell and Shirley Dermond, on Lake Oconee.

At that time, local law-enforcement teams reached out to GON to spread the word among sportsmen and anglers in an effort to find any information that could help bring justice to the Putnam County case.

The murders took place some time between Friday, May 2, 2014 and Monday, May 5, 2014 at the couple’s home in Great Waters, a high-scale neighborhood off Wards Chapel Road.

“Outdoors enthusiasts are an observant bunch, and we need their help,” Harry Luke with the Putnam County Sheriff’s Office in Eatonton told GON a decade ago.

Mr. Dermond’s body was found decapitated at their home, while Mrs. Dermond’s body was not found until May 16 when an angler fishing several miles down the lake near the mouth of Richland Creek discovered her body.

In April 2024, several stories were published on Atlanta news outlets that said new DNA evidence had been identified.

The story that was published April 24, 2024 on www.fox5atlanta.com quoted Putnam County Sheriff Howard Sills as saying, “It’s not Shirley or Russell Dermond and that it’s, hopefully, the DNA of the perpetrator or perpetrators of this crime,” Sills said.

No further news story has been released since the new finding.   

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