RENO, Nev. (KOLO) - A 42-year-old murder case--unsolved for decades and lately delayed in court--is finally moving toward trial with key decisions on what a jury will and will not eventually hear.
The 1979 murder of Bay Area college student Julia Woodward remained unsolved for four decades. Her body was found in a remote area in Hungry Valley north of Reno. She had been bound, her eyes covered with bandages, apparently marched into the desert and bludgeoned with a rock.
But among the cases on file in the Sheriff’s Cold Case Unit, her murder was always considered solvable and two years ago the break came--a tip that a convicted sex offender, Charles Gary Sullivan, had been living in Reno back then. DNA found on her pants was matched his.
It also turned out there was circumstantial evidence possibly linking him to the unsolved murder of another young woman, whose body was discovered in the same remote area, and the disappearance of a second woman with whom he had met.
The case has moved slowly, delayed by a change in defense attorneys and COVID restrictions, but it reached a pivotal moment recently with an evidentiary hearing--which was practically a trial in itself--seeking answers to some key questions. Would the prosecution be allowed to introduce evidence concerning those unsolved cases, essentially casting Sullivan as a serial killer with a pattern of sexual violence who had remained hidden and uncharged for decades?
After a weeks-long hearing, Judge Connie Steinheimer has said no, but she is allowing evidence of a later crime, one for which Sullivan was tried and convicted.
He was charged in 2007 with abducting a young woman hitchhiker on Interstate 80 in the Sierra, taking her to a remote spot, threatening her with a gun, handcuffing her, binding her ankles, telling her he would rape her. When he stepped away briefly she freed herself, fled and found help who summoned authorities.
The Nevada County jury failed to agree on the kidnapping and attempted rape charges, but did convict him of false imprisonment. The judge gave him the stiffest sentence he could--four years--and ordered him to register as a sex offender. He served his time in California and moved to Arizona, living in obscurity until his arrest two years ago.
The jury will apparently hear all of that story, including--it’s presumed--a first-hand account from his victim and, the judge ruled they can also hear of pornographic images discovered on a computer, investigators say was his, images including bondage and rape.
When that will happen is still unknown. Trial dates have already come and gone. At the moment there’s no new one.
EARLIER COVERAGE: Sullivan’s arrest.
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Jury will hear evidence of past abduction in cold case murder trial - KOLO
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