DNA Ties Convicted Killer to 1999 Louisiana Cold Case

Stock photo of police tape marking a crime scene. Mark Ralston/AFP/Getty Images

DNA science has solved another cold case.

This time it was the 1999 murder of Louisiana State University student Kassie Federer which has finally been closed.

Federer was only 19 and studying psychology at LSU when she was shot to death by an unknown attacker inside the Park Boulevard apartment she shared with her roommate around 3:30 p.m. on Sept. 13, 1999, WAFB reported.

Law enforcement officials said her attacker broke through a dead-bolted door and chased the teen student around the apartment before finally fatally shooting her, according to the Daily Beast.

“It does appear that she had time to grab a phone in an attempt to call 911,” one police officer told America’s Most Wanted, according to WBRZ.

WBRZ reported that Federer was attacked after coming home from school. Her apartment was not ransacked, which suggests the attack was not motivated by robbery.

Further, Federer’s body was fully clothed, which seemed to rule out a sex-based assault.

The only thing missing from her apartment was her knapsack.

Her dog was shut inside her bedroom, and the lights were on when the building manager found the body about an hour after the crime had occurred.

The only piece of evidence, besides the body itself, was a single glove which did not belong to either of the apartment’s residents, Fox News reported.

19 Years Later, DNA Identifies the Killer

After 19 years, DNA science has developed to the point where the trace amounts left inside the glove found at the scene could be processed. And the DNA, when tested, returned a match.

The suspect is a 49-year multiple rapist and murderer named Travis Green.

On Oct. 16, Baton Rouge police Sgt. Don Coppola Jr. announced that an arrest warrant had been issued for Green on charges of first-degree murder and aggravated burglary in Baton Rouge related to the 1999 crime, the Beaumont Enterprise reported.

Green is currently on death row in Livingston Texas jail for raping and murdering a 19-year-old girl in Houston, Texas, just 11 days before killing Federer. He was also convicted of raping and murdering an 82-year-old woman.

Because Green will be in prison for the rest of his life, East Baton Rouge District Attorney Hillar Moore does not plan to try green, WAFB reported. That way, Federer’s family will be spared the ordeal of reliving their daughter’s death through a trial.

Case Closed but Pain Lingers

“I feel like this is closing this part, but nothing’s going to ever close the hole in my heart,” Kassie’s mother Debby Durapau told The Daily Beast.

“I don’t know what closure is. This is something I don’t think I’ll ever come back from. I think of her every day.”

Durapau told WAFB, “That’s been the hardest thing for me. I know that she’s gone, I know she’s not coming back, but just the thought that someone shot my daughter at about 3:30 in the afternoon in her apartment.

“People say, ‘Oh just wrong place.’ No, she was in the right place. That person came into her place.”

“It’s been a long time coming,” Kassie’s father, Warren Federer, told The Daily Beast.

“It’s a big burden off of us. We know he’s not going to be out there doing that to somebody else’s daughter.”

“I want to thank everyone for their prayers and comments. I am still numb and don’t know how I will feel tomorrow,” Federer said.

“My wife and I, Debby and her husband, our sons, and everyone else whose lives ever crossed paths with Kassie’s have waited a long time for some answers.”

From NTD.tv

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