Lamont Belk never thought his family would get justice for the rape and murder of his mother, Vickie Lynn Belk, 28, in 1979. It has been years of living without knowing who was responsible for the homicide until 2022, when Charles County forensic scientists submitted Belk’s clothing for testing. They found a match and identified Andre Taylor.
“We get a DNA hit, we finally had a name of the person who was responsible for this. It was incredible, and that’s what led us to the ultimate conviction,” said Charles County Sheriff’s Office spokesperson Sgt. John Elliott, according to NBC Washington.
On Aug. 27, 1979, Belk, who was a management analyst for the Department of Agriculture, was returning home from work when she was abducted near the Stadium-Armory Metro Station in Washington D.C. Her body was found two days later by a teenager near Metropolitan Church Road off Route 227, in Charles County, 25 miles from her home in Suitland Maryland. The victim had been raped and shot in the head.
At the time, authorities retrieved some of her hair samples, nail clippings, bra, clothes, pantyhose, and brown shoes from the crime scene and preserved them in a storage unit. Though there was no DNA technology at the time, authorities later tested her dress forty years later and found a partial semen profile.
In 2022, authorities submitted the DNA profile from the dress. They entered it into the Combined DNA Index System (CODIS) when they identified Taylor, who had gone on to have a long criminal history. As a result, the defendant’s DNA was logged into CODIS, which resulted in the breakthrough.
At the time of Taylor’s arrest, the 62-year-old defendant was in a nursing facility with complications from medical ailments. Later, investigators discovered through Taylor's arrest record that he had lived at his aunt’s house just four miles from where Belk’s body was found.
During the interrogation, Taylor admitted raping Belk but denied having anything to do with her murder.
The judge disagreed!
“I just thank God for allowing us to be alive to bear witness to this momentous occasion. Our community is a little bit safer today with this person behind bars,” said 51-year-old Lamont Belk, who is a lawyer for the Tennessee Valley Authority and former federal prosecutor in Georgia, reported The Washington Post.
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