Authorities on Wednesday identified the suspected killer of a 17-year-old girl as a man who cleared him of raping and killing her in 1979 after passing a lie detector test.
On February 10, 1979, Esther Gonzalez’s body was discovered in a snowfall off a roadway close to Banning, California, according to a news release from the Riverside County District Attorney’s Office. According to the district attorney’s office, she was murdered the day before as she was making her way from her sister’s home in Banning to her parents’ home in Beaumont.
Lewis Randolph “Randy” Williamson was identified as her suspected murderer. According to the news release, forensic genealogy was used to locate him. In 2014, Williamson passed away in Florida.
Gonzalez was found to have been raped and killed by bludgeoning, according to the district attorney’s office. An unnamed male, described by deputies at the time as belligerent, discovered her dead.
According to the press release, the man—later identified as Williamson—told the deputies that he was unsure of the gender of the body. Williamson was asked to take a polygraph a few days after making the call.
According to the district attorney’s office, “He agreed and passed which, at the time, cleared him of any wrongdoing.”
For years, detectives worked on the case, uploading a semen sample from the crime scene to the Combined DNA Index System (CODIS).
“In 2023, members of the cold case homicide team sent various items of evidence to Othram, Inc. in Texas, initiating a Forensic Investigative Genetic Genealogy investigation, in hopes of developing additional leads,” the office of the district attorney stated. “Earlier this year, a crime analyst assigned to the cold case team determined that, although Williamson was seemingly cleared by the polygraph in 1979, he was never cleared through DNA because the technology had not yet been developed.”
A blood sample taken during Williamson’s autopsy was made available to the authorities, who used it to compare it to the DNA found at the crime scene in 1979.
The Justice Department “recently confirmed that Williamson’s DNA matches the DNA recovered from Esther’s body,” according to the office of the district attorney.
Authorities are looking for any information regarding Gonzalez’s case, Williamson, and “other potential victims,” according to the press release.
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