Jenny Lancour | Daily Press Pictured above is Tara Grant in a framed photograph displayed at her funeral in Escanaba one decade ago. The former Perkins resident was murdered by her husband in their home near Detroit on Feb. 9, 2007.

ESCANABA — Ten years ago today, former Delta County resident Tara (Destrampe) Grant was strangled to death by her husband, who remains incarcerated in a downstate prison for at least 40 more years.

On Feb. 14, 2007, Tara’s husband, Stephen Grant, then 37, reported his 34-year-old wife missing five days after he last saw her on Feb. 9 at their home outside of Detroit. He told police they had argued that night when Tara left in a vehicle and had not been heard from since then.

An extensive search for Tara was conducted by the Macomb County Sheriff’s Department with the assistance of police in Delta County searching for her locally.

During that time, Stephen was interviewed by the media, which televised him crying and begging his wife to come home. He had also hired a private detective to help in the search.

Three weeks after Tara was reported missing, her dismembered body parts were found in a park near their home. That evidence allowed police to serve a search warrant on the Grant home where more body parts were found in the garage. An autopsy later revealed Tara died by strangulation.

While police were searching the home on March 2, Stephen disappeared. Following a statewide manhunt, he was apprehended March 4 about 225 miles north of his home. He was charged with murder and mutilation of a corpse.

On Dec. 21, 2007, a jury found Stephen  guilty  of  killing Tara. He pleaded guilty to mutilating her corpse. He was sentenced on Feb. 21, 2008, to 50 to 80 years in prison on one count of second-degree murder and was sentenced to six to 10 years in prison on one count of disinterment.

Tara’s body was laid to rest in a cemetery in Delta County on March 26, 2007. Her grave marker reads: Loving mother, daughter, sister.

Tara was the daughter of Mary and Gerald “Dusty” Destrampe and the mother of two children who are in the care of Tara’s sister and brother-in-law.

Tara grew up in Perkins where she graduated from Mid Peninsula High School in 1990. After high school, she attended Bay de Noc Community College in Escanaba. She transferred to Michigan State University where she earned a bachelor degree in business administration in 1995. At the time of her death, she was working for an international engineering construction firm.

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Jenny Lancour, (906) 786-2021, ext. 143, jlancour@dailypress.net