Trash leads to ex-soldier’s arrest in 1978 murder, feds say. ’1 in 270 quadrillion’
A woman known for leaving her bathroom window open for her cats to roam outside was stabbed 37 times as she slept in her apartment in Germany in June 1978.
Now, a former U.S. Army soldier, James Patrick Dempsey, has been arrested in connection with her death, according to court documents filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of New York.
Dempsey, who is also accused of raping the woman, is a 66-year-old resident of Oneida, New York, Syracuse.com reported.
Information regarding his legal representation wasn’t immediately available.
From late 1977 to late 1978, Dempsey was stationed in Ludwigsburg, where Bärbel Gansau lived when she was murdered in her apartment, extradition documents say. Ludwigsburg is about 9 miles north of Stuttgart.
After German investigators revisited the case in 2020, they sent fingerprint evidence to an FBI liaison officer in Berlin, the nation’s capital, because they believed the suspect was an American soldier, according to the documents.
The fingerprint collected from Gansau’s bathroom window more than 45 years ago matched Dempsey’s fingerprints in a U.S. database, the court filing says.
The FBI ultimately seized trash from Dempsey’s home, and the DNA found in his garbage matched semen and skin samples from the crime scene during a comparison in 2022, according to the document.
“Investigators determined that the likelihood of a match was 1 in 270 quadrillion,” the document says.
Dempsey was arrested Feb. 13 and he’s to be extradited to Germany, according to officials.
He’s in the custody of U.S. Marshals Service, court records show. He’s to appear in court for extradition proceedings Feb. 21.
Oneida is about 30 miles east of Syracuse.
This story was originally published February 16, 2024 at 4:31 PM with the headline "Trash leads to ex-soldier’s arrest in 1978 murder, feds say. ’1 in 270 quadrillion’."
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