Meredith Emerson

Meredith Hope Emerson was a 24-year-old woman who was murdered in January 2008 by drifter Gary Michael Hilton. She was last seen alive hiking with her dog on Blood Mountain in northern Georgia on New Year's Day 2008. Witnesses claimed to have seen her with an older man on the Spur Trail connecting the Appalachian Trail with the Byron Herbert Reece Parking Lot. When she did not return home on January 2, 2008, her friends began to search for her, without success. Her dog, Ella, was found on January 4, 2008, in Cumming, Georgia, approximately 60 miles (97 km) away.