Cold case arrest leads detective to look into others

ABC-7 is still working to get new details on a 45-year-old cold case.

Last week there was an arrest in an El Paso murder case from back in 1970. And now ABC-7 has learned it could lead to other cases being re-opened.

ABC-7 spoke with the detective who’s looking into the city’s cold cases in an exclusive interview.

It was DNA from fingernail clippings off victim Doris Rivers 45 years ago that cracked it and that’s given El Paso’s lone cold case detective hope of solving others.

“There’s a list of about 70 cases and they’re going back to 1972 that are unsolved,” said Det. Michael Aman, EPPD’s only full-time cold case detective since the unit was formed in 2004. “I’ve read maybe, gone over about 15 of them, so it really helps if you’re sticking with it, because DNA is progressing.”

Aman has been part of solving five different cold cases, but none more miraculous than the 1970 murder of Rivers, whose granddaughther inquired about her murder two years ago, leading him to test fingernail clippings from the victim.

“I told her from the very start it’s a longshot, I cannot make any promises,” Aman said. “We’ve never done anything this old, but we’ll try it.”

DNA found on that evidence led to the arrest last week of 70-year-old Willie James Johnson in Mississippi. He has since been extradited to El Paso. In 1970 he was stationed at Fort Bliss and was one of the original suspects in the case.

“That was amazing,” Aman said. “I don’t think years ago this would have even worked at all.”

The property and evidence office where Aman found those fingernail clippings is located in Downtown El Paso. Aman said the arrest in that case has inspired him to test other El Paso cold case evidence stored in that facility.

“Whenever I go down there and I want to see the evidence on a case like that, they have it very quickly,” Aman said. “I’m not going to say what cases I’m looking at, but I’m looking at quite a few of them.”

Aman said originally they concentrated only on cases from 1972 on. Among the cold cases he’s now working is the 1966 murder of a military wife in Central El Paso. He added in the past police departments had to pay for DNA testing, but they can now request it to be done free by the FBI or Department of Public Safety.