On a beach in Fiji during Survivor, Joe Hunter openly mourned his sister Joanna Hunter, whose 2011 death in Vacaville, California, he believes was a homicide. Found hanging inside a bedroom closet the night of Oct. 6, 2011, Joanna’s death was ruled a suicide by the coroner and by subsequent reviews — conclusions her family rejects.
The scene included a bathrobe sash used as the ligature, an open suitcase and a note that read, “Take care of dogs.” Joanna’s husband, Mark Lewis, a pastor at The Fellowship Baptist Church, was handcuffed briefly and questioned, then released. Deputies reported no signs of a struggle. An external autopsy later described ligature marks consistent with suicide, and toxicology was clean. The case was closed.
Joanna’s family, however, had long suspected foul play. Her mother, Patricia Hunter, and brother Joe say Joanna had a decade-long history of abuse by Lewis, including documented strangulation, multiple restraining orders, and a 1996 domestic violence conviction. Joanna had repeatedly tried to leave Lewis and returned several times. After learning of Joanna’s death, Patricia said she believed the note and open suitcase suggested Joanna had been planning to leave — not end her life. Joe says the first name that came to his mind upon hearing the news was Mark Lewis. “I knew he did it,” he told “48 Hours.”
Initially, homicide investigators were not called, the bedroom was not treated as a crime scene, and evidence such as fingerprints, DNA testing and phones were not collected. Investigators later said certain records about Lewis’ past were not immediately available to deputies in the field. The family’s repeated requests for further investigation met resistance.
In 2014 media attention and a separate criminal case against Lewis prompted a reinvestigation. That year Lewis was arrested in connection with threatening and hiring others to firebomb the home of a former girlfriend, Sarah Nottingham. Nottingham said Lewis stalked and abused her after Joanna’s death; he hired people to attack her, and a Molotov cocktail was thrown through her parents’ bedroom window in January 2014. Lewis changed his plea to no contest on charges of arson, conspiracy and stalking and was sentenced to eight years in prison, ultimately serving five years before release on parole.
The renewed interest in Joanna’s case produced new details. Detectives reinterviewed a churchgoer who had said he played basketball with Lewis for hours on the night Joanna died; he later acknowledged gaps in his account and that he had left the church property at times. The Solano County Sheriff’s Office had additional forensic reviews and again concluded suicide. But the district attorney’s 2015 inquiry did find DNA from Joanna and an unknown male on the bathrobe sash; the male profile returned no match in CODIS, the national DNA database.
The family pressed on. In 2023 the sheriff’s office hired Dr. Bill Smock, a physician with experience reviewing autopsies for law enforcement, to examine the case. Smock concluded Joanna had been murdered: he said photos and evidence suggested two different ligature impressions on Joanna’s neck — one from a braided marine rope and another from the bathrobe sash. Smock told “48 Hours” he believed Joanna was strangled with the rope, killed, and then hung by the sash to stage a suicide. While under a nondisclosure agreement he could not share his findings with the family; once freed from the NDA he demonstrated on a mannequin how a marine rope would produce the observed imprint and how staging could occur.
The sheriff’s office and other forensic reviewers disputed Smock’s conclusions. Solano County officials said multiple forensic pathologists — including the original coroner, reviewers from the 2014 reinvestigation, and a 2024 review by Dr. Brian Peterson, a former president of the National Association of Medical Examiners — found no evidence of another person’s involvement. Captain Jackson Harris of the Solano County Sheriff’s Office has defended the handling of the case while also acknowledging, with hindsight, he would have investigated differently if he had known more about Lewis’s history. Harris said he does not have the marine rope Smock referenced and that some items in the home were not examined at the time.
Family allies and domestic violence advocates argue the investigation missed red flags. Casey Gwinn and Gael Strack of Alliance for HOPE International have called Joanna a “hidden homicide” and say domestic violence homicides are often staged to look like suicide. They developed a checklist of 10 red flags — including a prior history of domestic violence and prior strangulation — that they say law enforcement should consider when responding to suicides, overdoses or accidental deaths. Joanna’s case, they argue, met all those factors.
The family has sought accountability through advocacy and legislation as well as calls for criminal review. Their efforts contributed to the passage of California Senate Bill 989, known as “Joanna’s Law,” which became state law on Jan. 1, 2025. The law requires investigators responding to reported suicides, overdoses or fatal accidents to check for a history of domestic violence and, if such a history exists, to treat the death as potentially suspicious. The law passed unanimously.
The California Department of Justice has agreed to review the Solano County district attorney’s decision not to bring criminal charges related to Joanna’s death. Meanwhile, Mark Lewis has not been charged in Joanna’s death; after serving time for the Nottingham arson case he was released on parole, moved to Arizona, remarried and works in plumbing. “48 Hours” sought comment from Lewis; he declined to speak on camera.
Joe Hunter has taken his sister’s story into the public eye. His emotional tribute to Joanna on Survivor season 48 reached millions; he plans to compete again in season 50. Patricia and Joe continue to tell Joanna’s story at events and at the Sacramento Family Justice Center, hoping the law and continued awareness will help other survivors. Advocates who reviewed the case say identifying and acting on red flags in suspicious deaths can save lives.
Resources: If you or someone you know is experiencing domestic violence, call the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1-800-799-SAFE or visit thehotline.org. Alliance for HOPE International operates domesticshelters.org.