D.C. police said they have solved a 10-year-old murder case in which a bank-robbery suspect shot and killed a security guard by using DNA testing not available when the crime was committed.
U.S. Marshals and Metropolitan Police Department officers arrested John Williams, 52, in Beltsville early Tuesday without incident. Williams was charged with felony murder while armed.
Police said that on July 17, 1997, Williams shot and killed security guard Thurman Craig Brown while Williams tried to rob the D.C. Teachers Federal Credit Union, 903 D Street, NE, in Capitol Hill.
Brown, 36, suffered four gun shot wounds and was taken to an area hospital where he was pronounced dead.
Brown’s death went unsolved until this June when the FBI ran a DNA test on evidence taken from a baseball cap that fell during a struggle between Brown and his alleged killer, police said
The DNA was a match to Williams, who was arrested in a robbery of a shoe store a year after the bank shooting.
Williams also matched the physical description provided by a witnesses to the bank shooting, according to the police affidavit.
D.C. police Lt. Robert Glover, of the violent-crimes branch, said the case shows that police never close out a murder case until it is solved or the suspect is captured.
“It sends the message that we will never let the cases rest,” Glover said. “(The suspects) may think they can get away with something, but they can’t.”
