Judge Told of Confession in ’82 Slaying

A Palmdale man accused of sexually assaulting and drowning a fellow Navy courier 14 years ago in Virginia confessed to the crime last week, a federal prosecutor told a U.S. District Court judge in Los Angeles on Tuesday.

Richard H. Whittle, 38, during an interview with federal investigators before his arrest last Wednesday, told them he was responsible for the unsolved slaying of Pamela Ann Kimbrue in March 1982, Assistant U.S. Atty. George B. Newhouse Jr. said.

“At that time, the defendant fully confessed,” Newhouse told U.S. Magistrate Judge Brian Q. Robbins at a detention hearing Tuesday.

Federal prosecutors said after Whittle’s arrest that new technology, such as DNA evidence and more sophisticated ways of examining fingerprints, were the key to bringing a murder charge so many years after Kimbrue’s body was found in her car at the bottom of Willoughby Bay on the Norfolk Naval Air Station.

Newhouse said outside court Tuesday that Whittle showed remorse when he admitted to the slaying.

“He expressed great regret at having committed the crime,” Newhouse said. “He appeared to be very distraught.”

In the courtroom, Whittle, a slender, clean-shaven man wearing a blue shirt, casual pants and sandals, showed little emotion during the short hearing. Occasionally, he spoke softly with his public defender, read documents or replied, “Yes, your honor,” when the judge asked if he understood different aspects of the proceeding.

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Robbins ordered Whittle to remain in custody without bail pending his transfer to Norfolk, where he is to be prosecuted. The judge granted a defense request to allow Whittle to stay in custody in the Los Angeles area for 10 days so that he may meet with his wife and tend to other business before going to Virginia.

Whittle’s public defender, Sean Kennedy, told the judge that he advised against Whittle pleading guilty or no contest to the murder charge. Whittle faces up to life in prison if convicted.

Prosecutors said Whittle was a suspect early on, but the case crystallized more recently when investigators gathered enough evidence to charge him with killing the 21-year-old Kimbrue, of Bay City, Mich.

Although Whittle, a handyman at a Burbank clinical laboratory, was known locally as a devoted family man, federal authorities paint a far more threatening picture of him.

Investigators allege that Whittle raped and strangled Kimbrue, who suffered blunt-force injuries and trauma to her head and face. Bound at the wrists with rope, with a seat belt wrapped around her neck, she was found in the rear seat of her vehicle.

Also found in the car was a green ski mask, two makeshift mittens described as T-shirts stapled together, glass fragments from a broken soft drink bottle, hairs, and latent fingerprints.

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Investigators eventually found that 31 head hairs recovered from the ski mask were microscopically similar to Whittle’s hair. Sixteen additional head hairs and a pubic hair were also recovered from the woman’s car and found to be similar to Whittle’s, investigators said.

An autopsy determined that Kimbrue’s died from “drowning following mechanical strangulation.”

Federal investigators said Whittle was discharged from the Navy in July 1983 for drug violations.

Assistant U.S. Atty. Laura Everhart, who is prosecuting the case in Norfolk, said late Tuesday she expects justice to be served.

“It certainly didn’t hurt my case to have him confess,” she said. “They had no prior relationship. So far as we know, their paths had not crossed until shortly before this homicide.”