A cigarette butt found near the body of a teacher who was murdered in her apartment nearly 52 years ago has helped police identify a man they say killed her.
Rita Curran was found dead after being strangled in her Vermont home, Burlington, in July 1971.
The case had remained unsolved, but DNA evidence gleaned from a cigarette butt at the scene led police to say an upstairs neighbor named William DeRoos killed her in a 70-minute window.
The suspect, who was 31 at the time, was said to have left his apartment for a “calm walk” after an argument with his wife.
After he got back he told his wife two weeks not to say he had been out.
In 2019, Police Detective Lt James Trieb and a team of officers and technicians began working on the case as if it had just happened.
The cigarette butt that was found near Ms Curran’s body was key evidence.
In 2014, previous investigators had sent the calcium and other evidence for DNA analysis.
The test compiled a DNA profile of anyone who smoked the cigarette, but it did not match any samples in DNA databases compiled by law enforcement agencies.
The investigators who took up the case in 2019 contracted with a DNA testing company and the samples were compared with genetic material sent to commercial DNA testing companies by members of the public.
In August 2022, Burlington investigators were told the sample, which had been traced through relatives on both sides of DeRoos’ family, was pointing to him, even though he had no DNA profile on record.
Investigators then determined that DeRoos and his wife Michelle were living upstairs at the time of Ms. Curran’s death.
They had spoken to detectives after Ms Curran’s death but said at the time they had seen or heard nothing.
DeRoos and his wife, who no longer uses the last name, left Vermont shortly after Mrs. Curran’s death.
Their marriage ended after DeRoos went to Thailand and became a monk.
DeRoos remarried after returning to the United States.
He died of a drug overdose in San Francisco in 1986, police said.
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In a recent interview, DeRoos’ ex-wife, who used to live with him in Burlington and now lives in Eugene, Oregon, told investigators she lied that her husband did not leave their apartment that night.
Burlington detectives later interviewed a later wife who told them DeRoos was known for sudden outbursts of violence.
Lt. Trieb said during a press conference on Tuesday morning: “We are all confident that William DeRoos is responsible for the aggravated murder of Rita Curran, but because he died in a hotel room of a drug overdose, he will not be held responsible for the his actions, but this case will be closed.”
Ms. Curran’s parents died without knowing who killed their daughter, but the victim’s brother and sister attended the event held at Burlington Police Headquarters.
“I don’t think so much about the guy who did this as I do about Rita and my parents and what they went through,” Ms Curran’s brother Tom said at the event.
“I pray Rita and I pray my parents.”
