Vermont State Police
For over 5 a long time, the Burlington Police Division has remained stumped by the thriller of who brutally beat and sexually assaulted a 24-year-old elementary college instructor earlier than fatally strangling her inside her condominium.
On Tuesday, the division introduced they've lastly cracked the state’s oldest chilly case, revealing that Rita Curran’s killer was none aside from her next-door neighbor, William DeRoos. Throughout a press convention, police mentioned they used DNA from a discarded cigarette butt discovered on the scene to determine DeRoos because the wrongdoer of the July 20, 1971, slaying that at one time was linked to infamous serial killer Ted Bundy.
Appearing Police Chief Jon Murad mentioned that in July 1971, DeRoos, then 31, lived upstairs from Curran together with his spouse of solely two weeks. The evening of the murders, Murad mentioned the newlyweds received into an argument and DeRoos left for a “cool-down stroll”—although his spouse later offered her husband with an alibi when he was questioned by police.
“5 a long time later, she gave our detectives a distinct story: the reality,” Murad mentioned, noting that DeRoos in the end traveled to Thailand, the place he lived as a Buddhist monk. DeRoos died in 1986 in California of “acute morphine poisoning,” in response to a 2023 police investigation report obtained by The Every day Beast.
Curran’s surviving sister and brother attended the Tuesday press convention, thanking police for his or her continued efforts to resolve the homicide.
Kylas Nagaarjuna, who was married to DeRoos on the time of the homicide and whose interviews with police in the end helped resolve the case, instructed The Every day Beast on Tuesday that she continues to be “overwhelmed” by the information and that she “has conveyed a message” to Curran’s household.
“I don’t want to communicate to the general public about this,” she added.
Brandon del Pozo, who oversaw the 51-year-old case when he was Burlington Police chief for 4 years till 2019, instructed The Every day Beast on Tuesday that “Rita’s killer could also be useless but when that is all of the justice Burlington police can provide her spirit and her family members, then so be it.”
“Except the police preserve their reminiscence alive and proceed the investigation, the victims of unsolved murders are sometimes misplaced to time. I’m so pleased with the Burlington detectives who saved Rita’s case open whereas I served as chief, touring in [and around] the nation to gather comparability DNA and re-interview witnesses, and who by no means stopped till immediately,” he added. “The Burlington Police Division by no means forgot about Rita.”
As beforehand reported by The Every day Beast, Curran had simply moved to the bottom ground of a Burlington condominium with two roommates when she was brutally murdered. On the time, she was a second-grade instructor, taking graduate programs on the College of Vermont whereas working part-time as a chambermaid on the close by Colonial Motor Inn.
In line with an area report on the time, Curran was working towards together with her native barbershop quartet till about 10 p.m. on the evening of the murders earlier than she got here house to search out her roommates and one among their boyfriends, Paul Robinson. Robinson instructed The Every day Beast final yr that he and Curran’s roommates went out for a late chunk for perhaps “two or three” hours that evening—and that the instructor declined to affix.
Robinson mentioned that the trio returned house after midnight, and Curran was not found till one among her roommates went into their shared bed room and located her strangled. In an interview final July, he added that he remembered the roommate yelling at him to come back over earlier than “she opened the door and confirmed me Rita.”
“I used to be the one which known as the police. I instructed them there had been a homicide,” he mentioned, including, “I've all the time had a query about whether or not Rita was nonetheless alive after we received again into the condominium that evening.”
A chief health worker later concluded that Curran’s face and head had been badly crushed, and there have been indications she had been sexually assaulted earlier than she died of “guide strangulation.” Robinson and Curran’s roommates have been all cleared of any involvement within the crime. (Robinson didn't instantly reply to a request for touch upon Tuesday.)
The investigator’s report notes that authorities discovered a cigarette butt “laying on the ground” beneath Curran’s elbow. Later that evening, one other officer spoke to DeRoos and his spouse on the evening of the murders. Each instructed police “they heard nothing and Mrs. DeRoos acknowledged that she had been up round 1:00 a.m. however had heard no uncommon noises or the rest.”
Information reviews on the time additionally acknowledged that neighbors didn't hear any loud sounds—which Robinson discovered odd as a result of the partitions of their two-bedroom condominium have been extraordinarily skinny.
“I've to consider that somebody heard one thing that evening,” he instructed the Beast.
Regardless of the extreme public curiosity in Curran’s homicide—which even prompted authorities to institute a media blackout—the case went chilly. However in 1980, the case gained renewed consideration after Curran was named as a doable Bundy sufferer in Ann Rule’s 1980 traditional The Stranger Beside Me.
Within the guide, a retired FBI agent revealed there was a “exceptional resemblance between Rita Curran” and Bundy’s first girlfriend, Diane Edwards. The guide additionally famous that Curran labored close to the Elizabeth Lund Dwelling for Unwed Moms, the place Bundy was born.
The connection was investigated by the Burlington Police Division, native cops confirmed to The Every day Beast.
The February 2023 investigative report states that a “massive break within the case occurred in 2014,” when investigators have been capable of retrieve DNA from the cigarette butt left subsequent to Curran’s proper arm. Bundy’s DNA was among the many 13 people in comparison with the cigarette, and he was in the end dominated out. The report additionally notes that Robinson’s DNA was not a match.
Final August, the cigarette butt DNA was examined in opposition to DeRoos’—and investigators lastly discovered a genetic match. A month later, they met with DeRoos’ former spouse, who mentioned that he had been in jail twice previous to their marriage and that they each have been “into the ‘Buddhist scene.’”
The report states that Nagaarjuna revealed the pair received right into a “quarrel” the evening of the murders and that he left the condominium to chill down. She added that she didn't bear in mind how lengthy he had left however that the following day, DeRoos “instructed her to not point out that he was not at house” on the time of the murders as a result of he had a prison document and that the police “would attempt to accuse him of it.”
She added that after the 1971 incident, DeRoos moved to Thailand to turn into a monk. Ultimately, she additionally moved to be together with her husband and have become a nun, however they didn't have “a lot of a relationship after that as a result of it was in opposition to the principles.” The pair finally divorced.
For Murad, the closure of Curran’s case marks his division’s ongoing dedication to fixing the grisly homicide—and the significance of “open-source DNA databases.”
“When individuals doing an ancestry or family tree check examine the field saying it’s okay for regulation enforcement to make use of the outcomes, they're serving to resolve murders,” he instructed The Every day Beast on Tuesday. “They're bringing evil-doers to justice. They're delivering closure to households.”
“I'm tremendously pleased with the detectives who did this for Rita and her household,” the performing chief added.