She was a St. Mary's University criminology student writing an honors thesis on Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women in Canada.

Her 2000 Toyota Celica was found the next day, in the possession of her roommates, Blake Leggette and Victoria Henneberry, in Harrow, Ontario.

[2] On February 26, 2014, Saunders' body was found in a hockey bag, on the side of the Trans-Canada Highway near Salisbury, New Brunswick, Canada.

[11] Henneberry and Leggette also attempted to gain information from Saunders' family via these text messages to access her bank accounts.

[19] Unlike in Saunders' case, Tina Fontaine's accused murderer, Raymond Joseph Cormier, was acquitted in 2018.

[21] The #AmINext campaign was active during 2014–2015, and successfully advocated for the then in power Stephen Harper conservative party government to begin an internal investigation into the Royal Canadian Mounted Police's handling of MMIWG cases.

[23] The final report was released in 2019 and contains "231 Calls for Justice directed at governments, institutions, social service providers, industries and all Canadians.

They began a blog titled "A Homicide Survivor's Journey Through Grief", became an active social justice activist, which included testifying at National Inquiry into Murdered and Missing Women and Girls in October 2017.

[19][28][29][30] In 2018, Mi'kmaq poet Shannon Webb-Campbell published a collection of poetry that included a poem about the murder of Loretta Saunders.

[32] Webb-Campbell apologized to all of the families personally and republished the heavily edited book in collaboration with Lee Maracle.

[35] Community members, including Loretta Saunders' family, oppose this claim to Indigenous ancestry as well as Henneberry's access to Aboriginal supports.

[35] In 2020, Victoria Henneberry sought an escorted pass to attend an Indigenous women's sharing and drumming circle.

[36] This pass was rescinded shortly after due to public outcry and Henneberry is now prohibited from accessing Indigenous services.