John Kevin Woodward Bio – John Kevin Woodward Wiki
John Kevin Woodward, a tech executive from Calif., has been arrested and charged with the 30-year-old murder of his former roommate’s girlfriend.
“We are hopeful that justice can finally be served for Laurie and incredibly appreciative of the law enforcement agencies who have never given up on her,” Houts’ family said in a statement.
Age
He is 58 years old.
Incident Details
Woodward, 58, was tried twice unsuccessfully in the late 1990s for Houts’ murder. A judge dismissed the case for insufficient evidence after a jury could not reach a verdict after the second trial, and Woodward moved to the Netherlands after the case was dismissed, per the Santa Clara County DA.
On Sept. 5, 1992, Houts was found dead in her car in Mountain View, Calif., near a garbage dump about a mile from her workplace. The rope used to strangle and kill her was still around her neck, and police say her footprints were inside the windshield. Her “unrifled” pocketbook was also found nearby.
The Santa Clara County DA’s Office says Woodward was a prime suspect from the beginning, as he was alleged “openly jealous” of Houts, “having developed an unrequited romantic attachment to his roommate, her boyfriend.”
Though Woodward’s fingerprints were allegedly located outside Houts’ car, investigators in 1992 could never prove he was inside the vehicle.
John Kevin Woodward Arrested
Woodward, who resides in the Netherlands but is an American citizen, has been charged with the 1992 strangulation murder of Laurie Houts, a 25-year-old computer engineer. The latter was “ahead of her time as a woman in the STEM field,” according to a news release from the Mountain View Police Department (MVPD).
If convicted, Woodward faces life in prison.
“Over 80 latent fingerprints that were also collected at the time of Laurie’s death were re-examined by the Santa Clara County Sheriff’s Identification Unit, which resulted in even more fingerprints matching Woodward,” the MVPD’s news release stated.
The new information, along with evidence from the original investigation that pointed to Woodward as a primary suspect, led to a warrant for Woodward’s arrest for murder, police say.