DNA Leads to Suspect in Decades-Old Kansas City Slayings

Using DNA samples, some of them nearly three decades old, prosecutors have charged a 53-year-old man in Kansas City, Mo., with strangling a dozen women between 1977 to 1993.

Lorenzo J. Gilyard, a supervisor with a trash collection company, was charged Monday with 10 counts of first-degree murder and two counts of capital murder, the statute in effect at the time of two of the slayings.

If Gilyard is convicted in the city’s largest serial killing spree, he could face life in prison without parole, or the death penalty, Jackson County prosecutor Mike Sanders said.

Gilyard, who is married and lives in southern Kansas City, is being held without bail. He previously had been convicted in Missouri of assault, theft, burglary and sexual abuse.

Gilyard was arrested Friday night. His attorney could not be reached for comment Monday.

Gilyard’s friends and acquaintances were shocked to hear that he could be connected to the women’s deaths.

“People around here are just stunned,” said Tom Coffman, a spokesman for Deffenbaugh Industries Inc., where Gilyard has worked since 1986. “He was calm, even-tempered, respected by all the guys who worked with him.”

Relatives of the victims also expressed surprise that such old crimes could be solved now.

In an interview with local television stations, Tricia Southern said she “kind of gave up hope” that police would solve the slaying of her sister, Catherine M. Barry. Barry is among the dozen women Gilyard is accused of strangling.

Investigators said Monday that they were still scouring DNA samples collected in other unsolved crimes, searching for genetic evidence that could tie Gilyard to more cases.

“To use science to reach back and solve these unsolved cases is very moving,” Sanders said. “If it hadn’t been for the technology, we wouldn’t have made the connections.”

For years, police didn’t know there was a link between the 12 cases. The victims ranged in age from 15 to 36.

All but one of the women were prostitutes. Barry was mentally ill, according to court records, and was known to wander the streets and accept rides from strangers.

Nine of the women were found nude or partially clothed. Eleven of the victims were sexually assaulted; some of their bodies had been posed, police said.

Although DNA technology at the time was not nearly as advanced as it is today, police took samples of bodily fluids and hair found at the crime scenes. Police often used such samples to confirm the blood type of possible suspects.

As the years passed, the genetic evidence was tucked away in refrigerated warehouses, Sanders said. Also filed away was a sample of Gilyard’s blood, which police had obtained in 1987 when he was suspected in the slaying of Sheila Ingold. Laboratory results at the time were inconclusive, investigators said. Gilyard is now charged in Ingold’s slaying.

In 2001, the Kansas City Police Department received a multimillion-dollar federal grant to help investigators use DNA testing to clear unsolved cases. The department worked with its regional crime lab and used the money to pay overtime and other costs for work on the old cases.

“Solving old crimes is now a regular thing for us,” Sanders said Monday. “But we haven’t had a serial case, particularly one so painful and extensive.”

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Huffstutter reported from Kansas City and Marshall from Seattle.