Over four decades after a man, then 38 years old, raped and stabbed a girl 59 times in a California city, he has been sentenced to life imprisonment.
Gary Ramirez, now 78, was identified and brought to justice using DNA evidence in the 1982 rape and murder of 15-year-old Karen Stitt in Sunnyvale, California.
Judge Hanley Chew handed the man a life sentence with the prospect of parole in 25 years, according to authorities. The Maui native previously entered a no-contest plea to the 1982 murder on February 24.
The Karen Stitt 1982 murder case went unresolved for decades before detectives investigating the cold case in 2022 zoomed in on Gary Ramirez and gathered evidence to take him to court.
On a September evening in 1982, Ms Stitt travelled ten miles from her home in Palo Alto to Sunnyvale to meet her boyfriend. Around midnight, Ms Stitt made her way back to the junction of Wolfe Road and El Camino Real to board the bus home.
The next morning, her body was found about 100 yards from the bus stop, close to a blood-stained cinderblock wall. She had 59 stab wounds and had been sexually assaulted. Ms Stitt was left with the murderer’s blood and bodily fluids.
Later, her boyfriend admitted to the police that he felt horrible about leaving her, but he was worried about getting caught for being out late, per USA Today.
A DNA profile was used in 2000 to rule out Ms Stitt’s boyfriend as a suspect. In April 2022, it came to light that Ramirez was the most probable source of the bodily fluids and blood found at the crime scene. It was later confirmed by the Santa Clara County DA’s Crime Lab.
According to a District Attorney press release, the sentencing was possible due to a “continuous line of detectives” and the Sunnyvale, California, Department of Public Safety have “put their hearts and souls” into solving an “infamous crime.”
“Karen Stitt passed away more than 40 years ago, but she was never forgotten,” District Attorney Jeff Rosen said.
“Today, our Crime Lab, a tenacious prosecutor, and a committed detective have put the culprit behind bars,” attorney Rosen added.
Santa Clara County prosecutors said that Ms Stitt’s friends and relatives came to the sentencing hearing “to express their enduring sorrow and rage about this heinous crime, making clear that she has never been forgotten.”