DNA Captures "Night Stalker"
In 1990, a series of brutal attacks on elderly victims occurred in Goldsboro, North Carolina, by an unknown individual dubbed the "Night Stalker." During one such attack in March, an elderly woman was brutally raped and almost murdered. Her daughter's early arrival home was the only thing that saved the woman's life. The suspect fled, leaving behind materials intended to burn the residence and the victim in an attempt to conceal the crime. In July 1990, another elderly woman was brutally raped and murdered in her home. Three months later, a third elderly woman was raped and stabbed to death. Her husband was also murdered. Their house was burned in an attempt to cover up the crime, but fire/rescue personnel pulled the bodies from the house before it was engulfed in flames.When DNA analysis was conducted on biological evidence collected from vaginal swabs from each victim, authorities concluded that the same perpetrator had committed all three crimes. However, there was no suspect.
For 10 years, both the Goldsboro Police Department and the crime laboratory refused to forget about these cases. With funding from the National Institute of Justice, the crime laboratory retested the biological evidence in all three cases with newer DNA technology and entered the DNA profiles into North Carolina's DNA database. This would allow the DNA profile developed from the crime scene evidence to be compared to thousands of convicted offender profiles already in the database.
In April 2001, a "cold hit" was made to the perpetrator's convicted offender DNA profile in the database. The perpetrator had been convicted of shooting into an occupied dwelling, an offense that requires inclusion in the North Carolina DNA database. The suspect was brought into custody for questioning and was served with a search warrant to obtain a sample of his blood. That sample was analyzed and compared to the crime scene evidence, thereby confirming the DNA database match. When confronted with the DNA evidence, the suspect confessed to all three crimes.
Mark Nelson, special agent in charge of the North Carolina State Crime Laboratory, said, "Even though these terrible crimes occurred more than 10 years ago, we never gave up hope of solving them one day."
Some or all of the content on this page was excerpted from the Special Report Using DNA to Solve Cold Cases, developed under an award from the Office of Justice Program's National Institute of Justice. See award product disclaimer.
