Leslie "Hope" Houston was found unresponsive in her Anderson, Indiana home in October 2024. She died days later, and her case was initially ruled undetermined. It took her daughter's own investigation to get it reopened.
The day before Leslie was found, her daughter, Megan Tomlinson, requested a welfare check on her mother; police went to the home and believed she was okay. The next day, Leslie was found unconscious on the floor by medics. Her husband, John Daughtery, said she had fallen. A CT scan later revealed a massive, unsurvivable head injury. Leslie was declared dead on October 14, 2024, and taken off life support on October 17.
Leslie's death was initially ruled undetermined rather than a homicide. Megan spent seven months independently researching the case, reviewing autopsy results, and organizing documentation and recordings, which she provided to investigators. That work contributed directly to the case being reopened. In May 2025, John Daughtery was charged with Leslie's murder; investigators found signs of domestic abuse and possible strangulation. Daughtery's brother had previously been convicted of murdering his own wife in 2012.
On what would have been her mother's 47th birthday, Megan publicly launched Silver Lining of Hope, Inc., a nonprofit named for her mother that provides resources, forensic case reviews, and law enforcement training focused on domestic violence, hidden homicides, missing persons, and cases that fall through the cracks of the legal and medical systems. Madison County's chief deputy prosecutor has credited Megan's independent work with helping bring the criminal charges in her mother's case.
Through Silver Lining of Hope's H-O-P-E Initiative, Megan now provides case analysis and advocacy support so that other families facing similar circumstances — a death too quickly dismissed, a case closed before it should have been — don't have to navigate the search for answers alone.