When an Illinois veterinary medicine student is attacked in her own home, she uses the last of her strength to seek help but dies before being able to name her killer.

No explanation or potential suspect is off the table as investigators seek the truth behind an unlikely crime in this episode of Last Seen Alive.

No. of Last Seen Alive. Thanks for listening to Last Seen Alive. I'm your host, Leah, crime analyst by day, and true crime

storyteller by night. As always, I'm your co-host, Scott. Maria Khalil was last seen alive on March 6th,

1988. She was 21 years old at the time and lived in Urbana, Illinois. Urbana is a college town. In fact,

it's widely considered one of the nicer college towns in the U.S. It's a bustling small town with a

vibrantly diverse population and like many of its residents, Maria was there to learn. She'd grown up

a couple hours away in the Chicago suburb of Hinsdale. Hinsdale is one of the

wealthiest communities in Illinois, and Maria came from a wealthy family. Her dad was a prominent surgeon

who'd started in general surgery before moving on to cosmetic surgery, and her mom was an accomplished

equestrian. They were the kind of glamorous couple that local newspapers would

photograph together whenever they were out for a night on the town. However, you'd never know from

Maria's behavior that she came from a family that owned nearly 30 polo ponies, or that her dad had once

been presented with a polo award by Prince Charles. Maria was down to earth, modest, and treated others with kindness.

She drove around in a K car that gave no hint of her privileged upbringing. As far as a stranger

meeting her for the first time might have known, she might have been from anywhere. She wasn't one

to flaunt her family's wealth. Her car, her clothing, jewelry, all of that was very modest.

She was a very modest person.

She was also incredibly intelligent, so intelligent that after graduating from public high school

at the age of 16, she attended Brown University where she majored in pre-med and earned straight A's.

That's an impressive accomplishment in and of itself.

Very much so.

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