TX TX - Virginia 'Ginger' Freeman, 40, Brazos County, 1 Dec 1981

[YESorNO]

Here's an article about Ruth Richardson Green in relation to Earhart:

Investigators seeking clues to 18-year-old murder case

May 18, 2004

"The main suspect is dead...

...For more than 15 years, investigators have been at a stalemate in the case despite having a convicted killer at the center of their focus.

DNA analysis techniques — as far as officials at the Bryan police department know — never have fully been explored by investigators...

While DNA technology has been around for more than a decade, officials at the department this week said they have had limited resources to work with as a steady flow of new cases come in....

But then in May 1987, James Otto Earhart was apprehended in the murder of 9-year-old Crockett Elementary School fourth-grader Kandy Kirtland. Investigators caught up with him while he was sleeping in his car, which was parked about 50 yards from where Green’s body had been found 15 months earlier.

“ That was when we really started looking [at the similarities],” said Lt. Choya Walling of the Bryan Police Department.

... while there’s enough circumstantial evidence to have Walling convinced, it’s still probably not enough to convince a judge or jury, he said. And a confession from Earhart will never happen. He was executed in 1999 for Kirtland’s murder....

Another area of potential evidence that hasn’t been explored yet is DNA. Back when the murders took place, techniques for tracing DNA weren’t around. But if evidence has been saved, DNA tracing “might be the magic bullet that we need,” Walling said.

The Department of Public Safety doesn’t have a DNA sample on file for Earhart to use for any sort of comparison, and none was ever taken during the 11 years Earhart was on death row, Texas Ranger Frank Malinak said....

Bryan police also tried talking to Earhart behind bars — requesting an interview with him shortly before his scheduled death. He declined....

“ I pleaded with him [and] gave him the standard ‘We owe it to the family,’” Nesmith said. “He was very unconcerned. He didn’t focus on me. He said ‘I’m not talking about that.’”..."

Investigators seeking clues to 18-year-old murder case
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[CassieM]

The detective meant that James Otto Earhart is NOW the prime suspect, not that he was previous to Parabon's recent genetic genealogy work on the case. This case received much less coverage but was one of four where the suspect was identified through the work of Parabon's genetic genealogist.

Genealogists Turn to Cousins’ DNA and Family Trees to Crack Five More Cold Cases

 

[TedMac]

Authorities exhume body of suspected killer in 1981 case

"Monday we learned new DNA and ancestral results pinpointed James Otto Earhart as the likely killer in the brutal murder of Virginia Freeman in Brazos County.

Researchers only needed to recover a clay-covered bone from Earhart to retrieve a tissue sample.

"We're simply sampling some human tissue for the purpose of doing DNA,” said Harrell Gill-King, University of North Texas Director of Laboratory of Forensic Anthropology and Human Identification.

Investigators want the sample so they can compare Earhart’s DNA with DNA found under Freeman’s fingernails.

"In this case, the bones are in good shape so there shouldn't be any problems,” said Gill-King.

Lead investigator Kenny Elliot and Texas Ranger Joshua Ray say they are happy to have answers.

"We put everything we got into this case,” said Ray. “We have spent a lot of time traveling across the country, multiple states in hotel rooms, late at night going over evidence that we've already gone through..."

 

[dotr]

FIRST ON KBTX: DNA evidence solves oldest cold case in Brazos County

DNA evidence confirms James Otto Earhart murdered Virginia Freeman in 1981 in Brazos County

 

[imstilla.grandma]

In College Station, Texas, 40-year-old Virginia Freeman, a wife, mother, and real estate agent, was known for her energetic personality and deep connection to her community.

But on December 1, 1981, Virginia was found murdered at a vacant Brazos County residence she was showing to a potential buyer.

The shocking discovery was made by her husband, Charles Freeman, who’d grown concerned when his wife didn’t come home after work. He immediately called authorities.

Sheriffs observed that Virginia had been struck on the head and stabbed in the neck.

“The viciousness of the attack on a woman really got to me,” Det. Dick Gulledge, now retired from the Brazos County Sheriff’s Office, told “Exhumed: Killer Revealed,” airing Sundays at 7/6c on Oxygen. “We call it overkill.”

Wounds on her hands indicated that Virginia had fought for her life in her final moments. In a decision that would prove significant nearly four decades down the road, Virginia’s defensive wounds were carefully preserved.

“In those days we didn't have DNA, but we could get blood type. So I asked that her fingernails be scraped for possible skin particles from the perpetrator,” said Gulledge. “And so we bagged her hands.”

The medical examiner’s report revealed the extreme violence Virginia endured when she died. She was stabbed 11 times in the neck and her hyoid bone was broken, indicating that she’d also been strangled. No signs of a sexual assault were found.

The Prime Suspect In A Texas Woman's Murder Is Exhumed — What Did It Tell Investigators? | Oxygen Official Site

In College Station, Texas, 40-year-old Virginia Freeman, a wife, mother, and real estate agent, was known for her energetic personality and deep connection to her community.

www.oxygen.com