The slaying of former state Sen. Linda Collins of Pocahontas will be featured on Friday’s episode of the national prime-time crime television show Dateline NBC.
Collins was found stabbed to death at her Pocahontas home on June 4, 2019. Her body was found in the driveway, wrapped in a blanket and covered by a tarp.
The Dateline episode, reported by Dennis Murphy, will air at 8 p.m. on Friday on NBC and will include interviews with Collins’ daughter, Heather Tate Williams, and son, Butch Smith, as well as Randolph County Sheriff Kevin Bell and state Sen. Gary Stubblefield, R-Branch.
Collins’ friend and campaign worker Rebecca Lynn O’Donnell pleaded guilty in August 2020 to first-degree murder and abuse of a corpse in exchange for a 50-year prison sentence. That includes her no-contest plea to solicitation of capital murder for trying to have Collins’ ex-husband killed and framed for Collins’ murder.
The plea agreement spared O’Donnell from facing the death penalty at trial.