Grieving mom to meet with Sheriff Corbin
Return of the Advocate: Demand for Justice in the Katelynn Shepard Case
NORWALK — Tracy Thom, a veteran advocate with a successful record of helping crime victims, will meet with Huron County Sheriff Todd Corbin and detectives on Tuesday, but she isn’t going alone. Thom is bringing the woman she calls “the grieving mother” with her, and she has invited the Huron County commissioners and County Prosecutor James Sitterly to attend.
They are coming with a single, non-negotiable demand: that the Huron County Sheriff’s Office (HCSO) turn over the investigation into the death of Katelynn Shepard to the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation (BCI).
“This is not our first request,” Thom wrote in an urgent letter to county officials. “We have been asking for two years now.”
Thom asked county commissioners and Sitterly to attend the meeting with Corbin on Tuesday to “stand with Tricia.” Shepard’s daughter was killed eight years ago in a mysterious and suspicious one-vehicle “accident” on July 9, 2018. The sheriff started an investigation but stopped after a couple of weeks and never updated Tricia or her family again.
“This grieving mother has been patiently waiting for justice and closure for eight years. Tricia Shepard just watched two other mothers and families in Huron County get justice for the loss of their daughters, Amanda Dean and Regina Hicks,” Thom told officials. “Both cases were solved after Sheriff Corbin turned them over to the BCI.”
Tricia said she is happy for Amanda’s family and for Hicks’ mother that the killers of their daughters are finally behind bars, but she remains haunted by Katelynn’s case. “Where’s the justice for her?” Shepard asked. “She was a law enforcement officer, a corrections officer. Why doesn’t the sheriff acknowledge that? He doesn’t even respect that. Why doesn’t he want to help her family?”
Thom, in her letter to officials, attempted to persuade them to see Tricia as a constituent and a human being. “Watching other mothers get justice only compounded her pain,” Thom told them.
Sheriff Corbin did not return calls asking about the meeting or the request that the investigation be turned over to BCI. There has been speculation from inside the sheriff’s office that Corbin—under investigation by the state for his role in delaying the Amanda Dean homicide investigation for more than 5½ years—is considering resigning. Corbin also refused to address that question.
Corbin hasn’t spoken to the press for about three years, since the Sandusky Register exposed how the Amanda Dean homicide was mishandled. That case alone, according to Thom, disqualifies Corbin. “For 5½ years Sheriff Corbin told Amanda’s mom that Amanda was ‘safe,’” Thom said. “So how can this mom believe a word he says?”
Corbin is compromised in other ways, too, Thom said.
“The sheriff and the HCSO are all under investigation in a civil suit and also a criminal investigation by the Attorney General and the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation,” she told officials. “We feel this office is in turmoil and in no shape... to investigate the death of Katelynn at this time. We also feel that the evidence presented and testimony in the cases of Amanda Dean and Regina Hicks show a great deal of incompetence within the HCSO under the leadership of Corbin.”
“Each one of you has the power to make a difference in Tricia Shepard‘s life,” Thom wrote. “Every day she wakes up with unanswered questions... Every night she lies awake wondering what she could have done, wondering what happened to her daughter... and worse, wondering if a murderer walks among us.”
Thom told officials they must act.
“No mother deserves this; enough is enough. Her stamina and faith in the sheriff’s office is growing weaker as the years go by. Please support Tricia Shepard by asking Sheriff Todd Corbin to turn Katelynn Shepard’s investigation over to the BCI to give this mother and family some closure. A mother should not have to beg a sheriff to do his job.”
Advocate reclaims narrative
The unsinkable Tracy Thom has spent decades navigating the tangled bureaucracies of Northern Ohio’s criminal justice system. These days, she divides her time between her seven grandchildren (all under the age of 7) and helping local prosecutors get justice for victims. She is methodical, analytical, and aggressive, but most of all, she has true compassion for those caught in situations where law enforcement fails.
Thom provided state prosecutors with the “roadmap” used to convict Fred Reer for killing Amanda Dean in 2017. She only allowed her involvement to become public after a convicted felon, whom prosecutors say exploits victims as “clickbait,” began claiming she solved the case. That claim was empty; the podcaster provided no evidence and was described by investigators as a “hindrance.”
Thom, conversely, provided BCI agents with 17 emails identifying witnesses, phone records, and connections. The prosecutor’s evidence at sentencing in January aligned nearly perfectly with the information Thom provided.
In recent years, “popup” Facebook warriors began calling themselves advocates and emulating Thom’s work. One such figure, convicted podcaster Ashli Ford, became upset in January 2023 when Thom was named “Person of the Year” by the Sandusky Register. Ford campaigned hard for the award the following year — practically demanding that she receive it — but she was never considered by the newspaper due to the perceptio, at that time, that she misuses her online influence. This was prior to her becoming a convicted felon.
“Some people give advocacy a bad name,” Thom said. “They’re copycats trying to be me. The problem is they don’t have what I have: respect from community leaders, law enforcement and prosecutors, and they lack compassion. They dirtied it all up and behaved like criminals.”
In fact, both Ford and her mentor, Elsebeth Baumgartner, are convicted felons. While they refer to themselves as “advocates” or “investigators,” neither has professional credentials or training in those fields. Baumgartner was determined by a court to be mentally unstable in 2007; Ford was ordered to undergo mental health evaluations after her felony intimidation convictions in May 2025.
Thom does not use victims to generate social media revenue. She has quietly assisted Tricia Shepard for four years. Suddenly, Ford—currently awaiting trial on forgery and mortgage fraud charges—has decided to “help” Tricia as well. Tricia Shepard says Ford has been posting private family text messages and refusing to stop bothering the family.
Silence is over
Tricia says Ford has been exploiting her family for months. Ford is currently on probation and faces trial next month on additional fraud charges. She is also under investigation by the sheriff’s office for allegedly harassing Tricia Shepard, with the Norwalk law director seeking a special prosecutor.
Thom never truly went away after Ford and Baumgartner began their social media attacks in 2022, but the “dynamic duo of dysfunction” put a chill on her public work. Thom, who learned to fight the system after being a victim of domestic violence herself, has spent years fighting for women and children in misogynistic courtrooms.
On Tuesday, she returns to the most public fight of all. And for the first time in a long time, the grieving mother won’t be standing alone.
step down. He declined to address whether he was going to retire when asked directly about it.
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