Drone helps locate body of missing Country Club Hills woman with dementia: officials

CHICAGO - The body of a missing Country Club Hills woman with dementia was found near a Cook County forest preserve Saturday morning.

A search party gathered at Wolf Park forest preserve at 8 a.m. to help local police look for 78-year-old Yolanda Howell. 

Howell had been missing since Tuesday, Oct. 8, after she left her home near the intersection of 187th Street and Cedar Avenue and did not return. 

Also on Saturday, 40 volunteers went door-to-door, attaching Howell's photo to cars and distributing missing person fliers at a nearby grocery store. 

Just over an hour into the search at the forest preserve, at 9:15 a.m., a drone found a person lying in a ravine in the Forest Preserves Bartel Grassland property, according to the Forest Preserves of Cook County Police Department. 

Following further investigation, the person was an African-American woman who showed "no signs of life," said police. There were reportedly no signs of foul play.

Country Club Hills Police called off the search just before 11 a.m. and said Howell had been found. 

Howell's body will be taken to the Cook County Medical Examiner's Office for a post-mortem examination to determine her cause of death. 

She was a mother and grandmother, known for her exceptional baking skills. Family members said she had dementia and lived with her husband, who neighbors said also had challenges. 

"My mom was about hope. Whenever someone got sick, they would go to her and she would take care of them. She had that spirit," said Howell's daughter, Adrienne. 

The incident is under investigation by the Cook County Forest Preserve and the Country Club Hills Police.