GUILTY OK - Rhonda Hardway, 27, Tulsa, 7 Aug 1986

Sgt. Brett Henson is leading the re-opened investigation after a man came forward that was never even on the radar. "He disclosed that he was involved. He also implicated someone else. He just went through all the details of the crime."

He may have gotten away with it, but after nearly-20 years, a Sapulpan, 40 year-old John Pingleton confessed. "He told me that he wanted to get his life straight. God told him to you know, come forward and get it out if he wanted to get you know, right." Police went back to the crime scene, where they searched for the gun Pingleton said he used to kill Hardway. Investigators were convinced he had to've been there. "There was details that he gave us that only the person there would have known.

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John W. Pingleton in January surrendered to police and confessed to killing Rhonda Hardway, 27, on Aug. 7, 1986, detective Sgt. David Jones said.

Pingleton, 41, then implicated Vincent Partridge, 41, of Sapulpa...

Police announced Thursday that DNA evidence taken from the scene in 1986 matched DNA taken from Partridge earlier this year.

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Vincent Keith Partridge, 41, of Sapulpa has been charged in the Aug. 7, 1986, slaying of Rhonda Hardway, 27.

Hardway was kidnapped from 21st Street and Riverside Drive in Tulsa, then driven to the "Flats" area of Sahoma Lake, where she was beaten and shot in the head, police said. A 1986 report said her body was found holding handfuls of hair.

There was no evidence of sexual assault, the report said.

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