Early this month detectives learned that a sexual assault investigated by North Bay police in 2021 matched the DNA profile from the two murder cases.
Detectives collected a DNA sample from Gary, a suspect in the latest case. And matched the DNA in all the three crimes.
“We are hopeful that this arrest can help bring some closure to the families and friends that have been seeking justice for as much as 40 years,” the department said.
According to authorities, in July 1980, Latrelle Lindsay, 46, was found murdered at her home in Union City. She was sexually assaulted. And died of “asphyxia due to strangulation associated with blunt force injuries.”
“A DNA sample was later sent for entry and search in a law enforcement database, but no match was made,” per the police department’s news release.
Nearly 16 years later, in March 1996, another woman’s body was found by state transportation workers in the bushes along Interstate 780 near Laurel Street in Vallejo. Forty-six-year-old Winifred Douglas’ cause of death was similar to Lindsay’s: “asphyxia and blunt force trauma to the head and neck.”
