Cold Case News

[bessie]

DNA helps Ventura County detectives solve cold case murders
By Leo Stallworth
Wednesday, September 30, 2015 07:21PM

VENTURA COUNTY, Calif. (KABC) -- DNA has helped Ventura County sheriff's detectives solve two decades-old murders. But mystery still surrounds the case as the victims have never been identified.

Ventura County cold case detectives released a sketch of a woman who was murdered more than three decades ago in the parking lot of Westlake High School.

The murder was at the foot of a dirt hillside in the rear parking lot of the school. Without an ID on the victim and no witnesses, the case went cold. That is until DNA evidence recently linked the murder to 63-year-old Wilson Chouest.

"DNA was gathered from her clothing and under her fingernails that centered on Mr. Chouest," Ventura County Undersheriff Gary Pentis said.

[...]
"This case frames an ultimate importance of working cold cases," Pentis said.

"Just getting the DNA is not enough. You got to prove that he was the killer as well, and all of that takes time," Ventura County Sheriff's Det. Joe Evans said.

[...]
"The mainstay is to try to identify who these women are because they are someone's sister, possibly someone's wife, possibly someone's daughter," Pentis said.

See related threads on the two victims in the UID forum.

http://www.websleuths.com/forums/sh...-of-Wilson-Chouest-July-1980-*GRAPHIC-IMAGES*

http://www.websleuths.com/forums/sh...-UP11249-19-20-Pregnant-HS-Parking-Lot-Jul-80

 

[bessie]

24 Murders in Tri-Cities Area are Considered Cold Cases
Posted: May 01, 2014 7:21 PM CST - Updated: May 02, 2014 12:54 AM CST
Posted by Tracci Dial, News Anchor

COLD CASE MURDERS:
1960: 51-year-old Edna Wright, stabbed 35 times and had a broken neck, found at her Richland home.
1971: 60-year-old Ivah McDonnell, brutally beaten with a blunt object and strangled at her Pasco home.
1972: 64-year-old Viola D'Amico, shot in the chest at her Pasco home, the murder weapon found nearby.
1975: 20-year-old Shannon Varley, found shot and floating in a pond.
1977: 20-year-old Diane Merckx, possibly strangled, found in a shallow grave at Sacajawea Park.
1981: 61-year-old Raymond Varela, a transient found stabbed nine times near the Pasco railroad yards.
1983: 27-year-old Susan Burnham, brutally beaten to death and found near a rest stop in Benton County.
1986: 24-year-old Stanley Peterson, shot and killed in a vehicle along Interstate 82.
1986: 40-year-old Robert McDonald, found beaten and floating in the Columbia River near the Pasco Boat Basin launch.
1987: 29-year-old Edward Davis, shot several times with multiple guns in Pasco.
1987: 21-year-old Tracy Lynn Smith, found fface downnear the Pasco water tower, stabbed 40+ times in the head, back and torso.
1990: 34-year-old Jesus Cardenas, found dead of gunshot wounds in rural Benton County.
1990: 44-year-old David Gonzalez, shot and killed in his Prosser driveway.
1991: 29-year-old Francisco Olalde, found lying on railroad tracks in Pasco, strangled and hung over the side of a train car.
1991: 31-year-old Ernesto Hernandez, beat to death with a cinder block and found in Pasco.
1994: 72-year-old Evelyn Beagle, suffocated after she and her husband were tied up by two robbers. Her husband was able to break free.
1995: Avel Ayala Garcia, shot and killed in rural Franklin County.
1997: 13-year-old Anna Pelayo, found shot in the head on Taylor Flats Road.
1997: 50-year-old Pedro Garcia, found dead of blows to the head in a field of brush. Some talks of it being a serial killer, nothing ever confirmed.
2000: 39-year-old Juan Guzman Zuniga, left apartment to take out garbage and came back badly beaten. Died from internal injuries and officers were unable to get information from him after he was hurt.
2001: 51-year-old Cassandra Ray, found bludgeoned to death in her Kennewick home.
2002: 50-year-old Gregorio Lopez, gunned down on a Pasco street with an assault rifle.
2010: 30-year-old Juan Segoviano-Garcia, shot in the chest and burned, his body was found in a Finley orchard that was on fire.