DNA has linked serial killer Ted Bundy to the 1974 murder of 17-year-old Melissa Ann Smith in Utah, authorities have announced, closing a case that remained unresolved for more than 50 years.
Investigators said evidence taken during Smith’s autopsy contained a DNA profile highly similar to one linked to Bundy. Summit County Attorney Margaret Olson said officials were satisfied that Bundy was responsible for the teenager’s death.
Smith’s case was resolved through DNA links involving Laura Aime, another Bundy victim whose death was confirmed in Utah County last April. Authorities said Smith’s killing also bore the hallmarks of Bundy’s “pattern, motive, means and opportunity”.
Smith disappeared in October 1974, after Bundy had moved to Salt Lake City. Deer hunters later found her body, which had been bludgeoned.
Utah County Sergeant Mike Reynolds said the investigation underlined the value of retaining forensic evidence. “This case demonstrates the importance of preserving evidence,” Salt Lake County Sheriff Rosie Rivera said.
Officials have contacted Smith’s next of kin, none of whom still live in the area. “With every case closure, may we stomp the memory of Ted Bundy out,” Reynolds said.
Bundy has been dead since 1989, when he was executed in Florida by electric chair for the murders of two women at the Chi Omega sorority house at Florida State University in 1978.
At least 30 women and girls were killed by Bundy across several US states during the 1970s, while many others escaped or survived with injuries. A vial of his blood, taken after his arrest in 1978, was found in Florida in 2011 and used to create a full DNA profile for the FBI’s national database.
Bundy confessed to a number of crimes in the final days of his life, including some previously unknown to police, although not all of those cases have been confirmed.
