A DNA breakthrough has led to the identification of the man who kidnapped, raped and strangled a 20-year-old woman who was on her way home from work in 1980.
The body of Eve Wilkowitz was found near her apartment on Long Island, 42 years ago.
She had been on her way home to Bay Shore, in New York, after leaving her secretarial job in Manhattan.
Suffolk County police and prosecutors announced on Wednesday that the killer was a man who died of cancer in 1991, ABC News reports.
Herbert Rice, who was 29 at the time of the horrific crime, lived near the spot where Wilkowitz’s body was found - three days after she failed to come home.
Investigators touted advances in DNA technology as being central to their breakthrough.
"We’ve solved the 42 year old homicide case of Eve Wilkowitz," Suffolk District Attorney Raymond Tierney said when speaking at a news conference.
"This was a study in persistence, in determination to work the case no matter what."
Genetic genealogy was used by investigators to identify Rice, along with a number of cold cases across the country in recent times.
The technology enabled police and the FBI to submit the DNA left on Wilkowitz’s body to consumer DNA databases, which include countless people outside the criminal justice system.
A match was established through a relative of rice, whose body had been exhumed. Investigators compared DNA from his remains to the samples recovered from the initial rape kit and identified him as the suspect.
Wilkowitz’s sister, Irene, recalled the moment when detectives knocked at her door, informing her of the news more than four decades after her death.
"She never got to fulfill her dreams," Irene Wilkowitz said of her sister.
Rice had three convictions for minor crimes against his name, all of which were ineligible for taking a DNA sample at the time.
Suffolk Police Commissioner Rodney Harrison said these types of investigations were “never easy”.
“But the relentless work and partnership helped us bring closure to the Wilkowitz family," he said.
