EA piece of chewing gum that was spit out and collected by investigators led to the clarification of a “cold case” in Gresham, USA, that lasted more than 40 years, thanks to extensive DNA analysis. This comes from a press release from the District Attorney of Multnomah County in the US state of Oregon. The now sixty-year-old perpetrator was found guilty of murder; the sentence has yet to be announced.
On January 15, 1980, nineteen-year-old Barbara Tucker, a student at Mt. Hood Community College, was kidnapped, raped and beaten to death near a campus parking lot. The following day, fellow students discovered her body on the way to a lecture.
At first there was little evidence for the investigation, except for statements from witnesses who saw Barbara Tucker with an unknown man before her murder, as reported by the US news channel CNN. In 2000, a detailed DNA profile of the perpetrator was created using tissue samples taken from Tucker’s body. It then took another 21 years until Parabon NanoLabs, a company specializing in DNA analysis, identified sixty-year-old Robert Arthur Plympton as a possible perpetrator.
After investigators identified the suspect’s place of residence, they tailed him and were finally able to secure the spat out piece of chewing gum, which ultimately convicted Plympton as the perpetrator. The DNA traces on the gum matched those taken from Barbara Tucker’s body. Plympton was taken into custody almost three years ago. At the trial, which took place from February 26 to March 15, 2024, Plympton was found guilty of murder. The murderer will remain in custody until the sentence is announced on July 21st of this year. In the US state of Oregon, where the crime was committed, the minimum sentence for murder is 30 years in prison.
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