Man who raped and killed teenage girl in 1979 identified forty-five years later thanks to DNA test

A 45-year-old case finally resolved. On November 20, a prosecutor in California (United States) announced that the murderer of a 17-year-old girl killed in 1979 had finally been identified. However, at the time, the man had successfully passed a lie detector test, reports Fox News.

In February 1979, the body of Esther Gonzalez was found dead in the snow in Riverside. The investigation identified that the young girl had been raped and then beaten to death. It was a man who called the police to report the presence of the body on the side of a road.

A DNA test years later

Days later, authorities identified the caller as Lewis Randolph Williamson. Considered a suspect, he was questioned and agreed to answer several questions with a polygraph. He passed his test without problem and was therefore immediately exonerated.

Due to a lack of leads, the case became a “cold case”. A few years ago, however, a team took up the case again and noted that at the time, Lewis Randolph Williamson had never been exonerated via a DNA test. In 2014, the man died and a blood sample was taken during the autopsy.

It thus turned out that his DNA matched that of the semen sample taken from the victim in 1979. The murderer having died, there will be no legal proceedings but the investigation is still continuing in order to determine more precisely the circumstances in which Esther Gonzalez died.