Valerie Rider Crime – An Ohio woman committed a horrifying crime while tormented by the thought of losing access to her 2-year-old granddaughter.
Valerie Rider was convicted of strangling her son’s girlfriend, 25-year-old Whitney Hostler, and then dumping her body down a hill into a ravine with the help of her husband, Rodney Rider Sr.
“The Riders seemed to have their whole world wrapped up in that granddaughter,” Eric Holmes, Champaign Co. Sheriff’s Chief Deputy, said on Snapped. “I do believe that Valerie believed that she needed to control that situation.”
As suspicion for the murder fell on her own son, Randy, Valerie Rider also threw him under the bus to prosecutors. But how did the relationship between the Rider family and Hostler get so bad that Valerie was willing to kill to keep her granddaughter?
What happened the day Whitney Hostler was reported missing?
A little after midnight on Oct. 1, 2020, Randy Rider showed up at the Champaign County Sheriff’s Office, a little north of Dayton, Ohio, to report his girlfriend, Whitney Hostler, missing.