NEW YORK (WCBS 880) — A genetic genealogy website helped solve the murder of a 20-year-old woman from Bay Shore who was found beaten, bound and strangled 42 years ago.
In 1980, Eve Wilkowitz landed her dream job with MacMillan Publishing in Manhattan, according to her sister, Irene Wilkowitz. At the time, Eve was living in Bay Shore with her boyfriend and on the evening of March 22, caught the last Long Island Rail Road train home from Penn Station after a young writer friend dropped her off at the station.
But Eve never made it home. Three days later, her body was found close to the Bay Shore LIRR station she was headed to.
“She was outgoing and social. She had a lot of friends. She loved music and reading and writing and drawing," Irene said at a Wednesday press conference. “And mostly she liked being a big sister to me. She never got a chance to fulfill her dreams.”
For decades, Eve’s murder had been left unsolved, until Irene got word from detectives last year that they were fairly certain about the identity of her sister’s killer.
The FBI and Suffolk County Police identified Herbert Rice, who died of cancer in 1991, as Eve’s killer after a distant relative of his submitted his DNA to the genealogy website where it was found to have a familial link to DNA in the evidence kit from Eve’s rape and murder.
The relative connected authorities to Rice’s son who agreed to give a sample of his DNA to help the case.
Rice’s body was exhumed and a 100 percent identification match was made, according to officials.
The news was announced Wednesday at a press conference on Long Island.
"We've solved the 42-year-old homicide case of Eve Wilkowitz," Suffolk District Attorney Raymond Tierney said. "This was a study in persistence, in determination to work the case no matter what."
The district attorney said it was a crime of opportunity and that Rice had a non violent criminal record before the murder.
"This is my first time seeing him, I didn't want to see the last face that Eve saw when she was still alive," Irene said.
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