Prosecutors agreed Wednesday to review a decades-old murder investigation after an attorney said she detected similarities to attacks by a notorious California serial killer and not the man who was convicted in the case.
The Orange County District Attorney’s office agreed to review the conviction of William Evins in the killing of a 28-year-old woman in 1979 as part of a longstanding program that looks into old cases upon request.
But the prosecutor’s office said it’s too soon to tell where the review will lead, and they will have to look at the evidence to determine whether DNA testing is a possibility.
Attorney Annee Della Donna holds a photo of William Evins, now deceased, who was convicted of the murder of a woman in 1979,
Attorney Annee Della Donna, who runs the pro bono Innocence Rights of Orange County, said she made the request after detecting apparent similarities in the now-deceased Evins’ case with murders by the so-called Golden State Killer.
Authorities in Northern California arrested 72-year-old former police officer Joseph DeAngelo last April and said they believed he was the killer who had long proved elusive to authorities.
DeAngelo is charged with 12 killings throughout the state in the 1970s and 1980s, including one in Orange County in 1980. He has yet to enter a plea.
Joseph DeAngelo is charged with 12 killings throughout the state in the 1970s and 1980s, including one in Orange County in 1980
As a teen, Della Donna said she was the victim of an abduction attempt and years later saw a sketch of the Golden State Killer suspect that she thought resembled her attacker.
‘As an innocence attorney, my little red flags went up,’ she said. ‘Way too many discrepancies in terms of lack of evidence against him. … It was just way too suspicious not to look into it.’
She started probing rape and murder cases that had occurred nearby and came across Evins’ case, she said.
She said she lived six blocks away from 28-year-old victim Joan Anderson and the way Anderson was killed bears similarities to cases involving the serial killer.
She also said Evins, who died in 2013, pleaded guilty after a jailhouse informant said he had confessed to the crime.
‘We believe that this murder was another Golden State Killer case,’ she told reporters, adding that she had also contacted Sacramento County sheriff’s officials and the FBI.
‘It’s too early to tell if there’s similarities or not,’ said Susan Kang Schroeder, the prosecutor office’s chief of staff. ‘We don’t know.’
DeAngelo (pictured), accused of being the so-called Golden State Killer, worked as a police officer in Northern California when Joan Anderson 28, was killed
Prosecutors have agreed to review Evins’ (pictured left) case, who was convicted of killing Anderson (R) in 1979
Evins originally had his murder case thrown out in 1985, but was rearrested shortly thereafter when a notorious jailhouse informant named James Dean Cochrum said that Evins confessed to the slaying.
Intelligence analyst Matt Kelly told ABC News that that Cochrum was the ‘most notorious of a notorious group of jailhouse informants.’
Evins originally had his murder case thrown out in 1985, but was rearrested shortly thereafter
‘He claims to have overheard … five different people confess to five different murders. Totally unheard of.’
In profiling the Golden State Killer for ABC News, Kelly said what was most striking was the suspect’s methodical planning and sheer brazenness.
‘He cut blinds from houses and used as ligatures… . Most of the Southern California murders he bound his victims but then take the ligatures with him. That was actually a departure from his MO in Northern California where he would keep people tied up,’ said Kelly.
After years of research and interviewing those closest to Anderson, along with Elvin’s ex-wife and daughter, Della Donna said she’s near certain that police arrested the wrong man.
‘It’s their responsibility now to find if there is any DNA [from Anderson’s case] and test it,’ Della Donna said of Orange County law enforcement officials .
‘If there is no DNA then we’re going to look at this case as filing a posthumously writ of habeas corpus to have Evins declared innocent.’
In an eerily similar case, questions surrounding Oscar Clifton’s (L) murder conviction in 1975 of Donna Jo Richmond (R) have been raised
Earlier this week, doubts were raised about another case involving a man convicted of killing a 14-year-old girl in December of 1975.
Oscar Archie Clifton also died in 2013 while serving a life sentence in prison after being convicted of murdering Donna Jo Richmond in Exeter, California.
Clifton was 35 at the time he was arrested for kidnapping after authorities found an invoice book that they believed to belong to the carpenter – based on the name written inside.
Hours after his arrest, the young girl was discovered by another resident. Richmond was stabbed and strangled and was not wearing pants or underwear at the time she was found dead.
There has been speculation about who killed Richmond after the 72-year-old accused Golden State Killer was found to have worked in Exeter as a police officer during the time Richmond’s death.
The city is also located in Tulare County – where several of the crimes that DeAngelo is accused of committing took place.