Police in Lafayette, Indiana, discovered Laportia Shenett, 34, and Kadeisha Ross, 28, dead inside an apartment on Cochise Drive early Saturday morning, March 1, 2025, sending a wave of sorrow through the east side of the city.
Officers from the Lafayette Police Department rolled up to the Village Square Apartments around 7:30 a.m. after a call—maybe a neighbor’s hunch, maybe a welfare check—led them to the grim scene.
Inside the unit, tucked just north of South Street near I-65, they found the two women lifeless, a discovery that’s left this tight-knit community grasping for answers.
The Tippecanoe County Coroner stepped in quick, confirming the identities of Shenett and Ross, both Lafayette locals who called this place home. Autopsies are underway, set for early this week, as investigators scramble to figure out how they died—whether it was violence, something accidental, or a twist no one saw coming.
“Our hearts are with their families,” a coroner’s office voice said softly, asking folks to give the grieving some space while the truth unfolds. Cops aren’t saying much yet, just that it’s an active case, and they’re treating it with the weight it deserves.
What happened in that apartment is still a puzzle, the kind that keeps detectives up at night. The Village Square complex, a cluster of low-rise buildings off the beaten path, isn’t known for trouble, making this all the more jarring.
Was it a quiet tragedy that built up behind closed doors, or did something—or someone—burst in and turn everything upside down? “It’s not the kind of thing you expect around here,” a neighbor muttered, peering out at the police cars that lingered well past sunrise. The women’s lives, now cut short, are the focus as police comb the scene for clues—anything to crack the silence.
Lafayette’s no stranger to loss, but this one’s hitting different—two women gone in a blink, their stories paused before they could finish. Shenett, at 34, and Ross, just 28, were part of the city’s fabric, and their deaths mark a dark start to March.
The coroner’s keeping tight-lipped until those autopsies reveal more, but the wait’s agony for families and friends left staring at empty spaces where Laportia and Kadeisha used to be. “They didn’t deserve this, whatever it was,” a friend said, voice cracking with the raw edge of grief. The police are on it, promising updates when they’ve got something solid, but for now, it’s a heavy hush over Cochise Drive.
As the investigation churns, the community’s holding its breath, leaning on each other while the questions pile up. How did it happen? Why these two? The answers are locked away in that apartment for now, waiting for science and legwork to pry them loose. “We just want to know,” another resident sighed, watching the world go by from a stoop nearby.
If it turns out to be foul play, it’ll be the second and third homicides in Tippecanoe County this year—a stat nobody wants to see climb. Until the coroner and cops lay it out, Lafayette mourns Laportia Shenett and Kadeisha Ross, two souls gone too soon, their light snuffed out in a mystery that’s only just begun.