WV WV - Leah Hickman, 21, Huntington, 14 Dec 2007 - #1

[Taximom]

Cause of death, some evidence and direction of case are topics for the conf. Sheriff, agents, etc met w/family yesterday and share more details w/them than they'll share with us.

Continually investigating this case with ST police and FBI.

Continue to withhold certain info from the public.

Reveal the following new info:
ME's office has had this info for some time.
COD was strangulation.
No evidence at the scene indicating a sexual assault.
No reason to believe this was a random act. Still believe to this date that the person(s) responsible for her murder is familiar w/Leah and is familiar w/the building where she lived.

Know some DNA results, still others to be sent to the FBI lab in Charleston for results.

Open to questions:
Can't say on scale of 1-10 how close they are to an arrest, but certainly has hopes there will be one.
Haven't excluded anyone. Won't narrow it down to 1, 2, or 10

How does ruling out sexual assault help LE? Tends to help w/motive, and would exclude that as a possible motive.

Won't discuss possible motive.

No reward established at this time. Decision they would make at a time that is more appropriate. (hmmmm)

Basically saying there's really no relation w/this case to Marshall U...it's just that she was a student there. (more hmmmm)

Investigation is focused and crime is not random.

(come on, someone ask about the plastic!!)
It's still going, but the guy is rambling.

 

[Taximom]

Why FBI is testing vs. State Police lab?
Couple tests that SP lab can't do (no capability). (hmm wonder what those are?) Will be done at Quantico or other regional FBI labs. Graduated stair-stepping process, more specific test.

Testing complete? It's fluid, depends on what's going on at their lab at the time. Several months? Can't say, hopefully sooner than later.

More than 50...but didn't catch "what" that was about! (tests?)

Family very accomodating to them when asked not to discuss the case details that they know.

Just yesterday they found out she had been strangled.

I didn't transcribe everything,but these were the most important points, IMO.

Sorry for typo's etc.

 

[concernedperson]

Thanks, Taximom. Lots of info from LE. The fact that they have more to be tested may very well nail the perp. I guess most of us thought it wasn't random because her body was found in the crawl space indicating someone was familiar with the building.

 

[SuziQ]

Taximom, thank you for transcribing for us. This case is very slow going isn't it?

 

[Taximom]

You're very welcome, SuziQ and cp.

It is going slow, but I really feel they know who the killer is. They seemed confident today with their investigation.

It kind of reminds me of the Michelle Young case. Neither of the victim's families in these two cases are venting to media about how long it's taking for an arrest. In both cases, that leads me to think they know exactly who the murderers are.

I just hope they are keeping an eye on Leah's killer so that he/she won't do it again to someone else!

 

[drumstick]

Interesting to me that LE released information that this was NOT a sex crime. Leah was strangled to death.

It was also not a robbery since her purse, car and all personal belongings were left undisturbed.

On Greta last night, it was stated that le believes Leah knew her attacker.

Back to motive .....

Who would want to kill Leah Hickman?

???

 

[DenverMom]

http://sundaygazettemail.com/News/200803130815

-snip-

The West Virginia State Police Crime Lab can do nuclear DNA testing, but not mitochondrial DNA testing, said Lt. H.B. Myers, head of the lab's biochemistry section. Where there is only one copy of a nuclear DNA in a cell, there are multiple copies of mitochondrial DNA, he said.
"So there may not be enough for our type of testing but there may be enough for mitochondrial testing," Myers said.



-snip-

 

[concernedperson]

http://sundaygazettemail.com/News/200803130815

-snip-

The West Virginia State Police Crime Lab can do nuclear DNA testing, but not mitochondrial DNA testing, said Lt. H.B. Myers, head of the lab's biochemistry section. Where there is only one copy of a nuclear DNA in a cell, there are multiple copies of mitochondrial DNA, he said.
"So there may not be enough for our type of testing but there may be enough for mitochondrial testing," Myers said.



-snip-

Thanks for the article. It seems they have some evidence that when processed may lead to the killer. I sure hope so.

 

[RubyJune]

Please explain this process to me. I'm just not getting it......TIA

 

[concernedperson]

Please explain this process to me. I'm just not getting it......TIA

Here is an FBI link that gives a diagram of nuclear and mitochondrial DNA. It also gives a brief description.

http://www.fbi.gov/hq/lab/fsc/backissu/july1999/dnaf1.htm

 

[RubyJune]

Here is an FBI link that gives a diagram of nuclear and mitochondrial DNA. It also gives a brief description.

http://www.fbi.gov/hq/lab/fsc/backissu/july1999/dnaf1.htm

After reading that it sounds like they may be looking at a female being the killer

 

[concernedperson]

After reading that it sounds like they may be looking at a female being the killer

That is a possibility.

 

[DenverMom]

Both females and males have mitochondrial DNA, but the mitochondrial DNA is inherited only from the mother.

I hope they are able to catch who did this!

 

[Bobbisangel]

Well this is sure a puzzle. No sexual assult. I'm glad that there wasn't but what could have been the motive? I wonder if it could have been that ex-boyfriend of her sisters? Maybe he came there looking for the sister and him and Leah got into an argument and he ended up killing her. It doesn't make sense that someone would just go there and strangle her. I wonder if she would have confronted him if he stopped by to get his things or to see her sister. I don't have any idea what her personality was like so it is hard to tell.

It seems to take forever for the testing to get finished. Did they say they still have to send some evidence to the FBI labs? If so, I wonder why it hasn't been sent yet? Waiting is such a pain.

 

[TGIRecovered]

Has Leah's sister been ruled out as a suspect or possible accomplice?

Susan

 

[concernedperson]

Has Leah's sister been ruled out as a suspect or possible accomplice?

Susan

Not that I am aware of.

 

[SuziQ]

Trying to rap my mind around this. Could it also be that a male suspect refused to give a DNA sample and his mother obliged and they are testing hers?

 

[DenverMom]

From the quote in the news article, it sounded like they have a very small sample of some sort, and are hoping the FBI can extract mitochondrial DNA from it.

There are many more copies of mitochondrial DNA than nuclear DNA per cell, so if they have a small number of cells, they will be better able to get sequence information from mitochondrial than nuclear DNA.

 

[Taximom]

LE said in the PC they have not ruled out anyone.

 

[WV_Lady]

Try NG and Greta transcripts maybe? I remember this too, you are not crazy...well, not in relation to this anyway

It was in the local news for sure and deleted shortly after they posted it. It was discussed here or on "Sessions" message board about how the news of the plastic disappeared. I thought since the police were so tighted mouthed....that they had requested that the information of plastic be deleted.