Six decades later, Spokane police solve 9-year-old's slaying – The Columbian

DNA helps unravel cold case of girl killed in 1959 By Associated Press Published: November 20, 2021, 7:13pm SPOKANE — Police in Eastern Washington say they have solved the slaying of a 9-year-old girl, 62 years after the crime occurred. The Spokane Police Department used advanced DNA analysis, forensic genealogy and traditional detective work to name John Reigh Hoff as the killer of young Candice “Candy” Elaine Rogers in 1959. Hoff died in 1970. “This is kind of the case that’s been the giant log jam for cold cases,” Spokane Police Department Major Crimes Detective Zac Storment said during a news conference Friday. “I keep saying it’s the Mount Everest of our cold cases, the one that we could never seem to overcome. But at the same time, nobody ever forgot.” The case began on March 6, 1959, when Rogers was selling Camp Fire Girls mints in a Spokane neighborhood. She had set out from her home about 4 p.m. and disappeared. After 16 days of searching, two hunters found Rogers shoes northwest of Spokane. A subsequent search found the girl’s body hidden in a pile of pine needles and tree boughs. She had been sexually assaulted and strangled. “It…
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