Michel Fournier has been found guilty of murdering his wife, Susan “Phoenix” Lane, after a community search in Oregon uncovered her body beneath a tarp close to the home she shared with him near Mount Hood.
Fournier, in his 70s, was convicted of second-degree murder following a seven-day trial in February 2026. He was sentenced to life in prison, with the possibility of parole after 25 years.
Lane, 61, disappeared on 22 November 2024 after failing to open the Hoodland Bazaar, a gift shop where she worked in the small Mount Hood community of Welches. Her white Ford F-250 was later found about seven miles from her home, but there was no sign of Lane or her two dogs, Elrond and Elros.
Friends initially feared she had been injured while hiking. However, several people close to her told investigators that she would not have taken her dogs to the area where the truck was discovered, because she preferred to let them run off the lead in quieter places.
The search for Susan “Phoenix” Lane
Sarah Caswell, who ran a pizza shop beside the Hoodland Bazaar, became alarmed when Lane failed to arrive for work. She contacted Aaron Clark, a Clackamas County sheriff’s deputy who regularly patrolled the Mount Hood region.
A welfare check at Lane’s house found the lights on and the door unlocked. But there was no sign of Lane or the dogs. Her son Dakota, who lived at the property, told investigators he had last exchanged messages with his mother on the morning she disappeared.
The following day, local resident Cari Gesch noticed a white pickup parked in an unusual position on Salmon River Road. After seeing a social media appeal asking whether anyone had seen Lane or her truck, she realised it might be the missing vehicle.
Authorities began a search-and-rescue operation, with volunteer teams combing the forest. At the same time, Lane’s friends told investigators about growing tensions in her marriage to Fournier, a French-Canadian long-haul lorry driver.
Lane had reportedly told friends that Fournier was controlling and that she was making plans to leave him. She had allegedly begun moving belongings, including a laptop, to the bazaar and had brought the dogs to work after saying that Fournier had threatened them.
Fournier did not contact authorities until two days after Lane disappeared. During an interview, he said he had last seen her at home on the morning of 22 November. He claimed he had travelled by hitchhiking to an auto-parts shop in Halsey, about 33 miles away, to obtain a car part.
Investigators later discovered security footage showing Lane’s truck travelling towards Portland with the dogs in the back. The vehicle was then recorded outside the Halsey auto-parts shop while Fournier was seen inside.
Further footage showed the truck returning towards Mount Hood without the dogs. Detectives concluded that Fournier had driven the vehicle, contradicting his account that he had hitchhiked.
Lane’s mobile phone travelled along the same route before its signal stopped near Portland airport. Detectives found the phone in the Columbia River, where it had been deliberately broken apart and thrown into the water.
Lane’s body was eventually found on 29 November, the day after Thanksgiving, by James Evans, a local volunteer who had organised an independent search after the official operation was called off.
Evans said he had been checking woodland a few hundred feet from Lane’s home when he noticed a pile of rubbish and several tarpaulins. Beneath one of them, he found boots and legs which he recognised as belonging to Lane.
Evidence against Michel Fournier
Lane’s autopsy found that she had been shot three times, in the head, neck and chest, with a .22-calibre weapon. Investigators said the wounds suggested she had been ambushed as she left the house to go to work.
The murder weapon was never recovered. But forensic testing found Lane’s blood in the back of Fournier’s Volkswagen truck. Investigators also found .22-calibre ammunition at the house and a shell casing in the driveway.
Prosecutors said Fournier had a motive because Lane had served him with divorce papers days before her death and had sought the property where they lived. They argued that he killed her after realising he could lose the home.
Fournier denied killing Lane and pleaded not guilty. He did not give evidence at trial, although recordings of lengthy police interviews were played to the jury.
During one interview, Fournier suggested he had been poisoned after becoming ill at home while taking heart medication with a bottle of Gatorade. Tests on the bottle found no known poisons or heavy metals.
In a later interview from jail, Fournier admitted killing the dogs. He said he had first tried to restrain them with cable ties and then suffocated them with a lead.
The bodies of Elrond and Elros were found down a steep embankment near the Columbia River, along the road out of Portland. In May 2026, Fournier was charged in connection with their deaths. He pleaded not guilty and is awaiting trial.
Detective Alex Monarch said Fournier’s manner changed when confronted with footage showing Lane’s truck at the auto-parts shop. Fournier stopped answering questions and was arrested for murder.
The jury took about three hours to reach its verdict, including a lunch break.
A community remembers Phoenix Lane
Lane had moved to Mount Hood after the death of her first husband, Fred, in a car accident in 2009. She later met Fournier, gained a lorry-driving licence and moved with her sons to the area after falling in love with the mountain landscape.
She married Fournier in 2012 and adopted the name Phoenix, reflecting what friends described as her belief that she had rebuilt her life after tragedy.
Lane became a familiar figure at the Hoodland Bazaar, where she sold crystals, rocks, rugs and Turkish lamps and displayed her artwork. She also led sound baths and took part in meditation groups in the local community.
Her son Jesse described her as “the coolest mom in the world”, while Dakota remembered her arriving at his school on a motorcycle when he was in kindergarten.
After Fournier’s conviction, Lane’s sons thanked the volunteers, friends and law enforcement officers who had continued looking for her. Dakota is now restoring the property his mother loved and hopes it can eventually benefit the family.
The room at the Hoodland Bazaar where Lane led sound baths has since been renamed the Phoenix Room. Friends said it would serve as a place of healing and safety, preserving the memory of a woman whose disappearance brought the Mount Hood community together.
