Powered by. [2] The police received more than 100 tips following the release of the new images. He has worked for promotions such as World Championship Wrestling (WCW), Extreme Championship Wrestling (ECW), the World Wrestling Federation (WWF), NWA Total Nonstop Action (NWA TNA), and Ring of Honor (ROH). Investigators say Martinko was murdered on December 19th, 1979 and her body found the next day in a family car in the Westdale Mall parking lot. Jerry Burns is still behind bars . Hi all - I discuss the case of Michelle Martinko, who was murdered in 1979 in Iowa, this week on DNA: ID podcast. This is what eventually helped authorities identify the culprit - Jerry Lynn Burns. [9] She was last seen almost 9p.m. outside of a jewelry store in the mall. Months before his February . We need somebody from their family to have tested in order to resolve these cases.". Pat was a member of St. Mary's Catholic Church, and enjoyed quilting, collecting teddy bears, gardening and farming with her husband. [29] The judge determined the search history was not usable in the trial due to the decades of time separating the murder and the searches. Burns maintained that he did not know Martinko and was not there when she died, although an investigator later testified that Burns did not specifically deny killing Martinko. This revealed everything, and Burns was ultimately declared guilty of first-degree murder. In October 2018, DNA was covertly collected from an Iowa man, Jerry Lynn Burns, and was found to match the sample discovered on Martinko's clothing. Viewers also wondered if there was a connection to the disappearance of Burns' cousin, Brian Burns. Vikings PR. Burns made an initial court appearance via video Thursday morning and said he would fill out an application for a court-appointed counsel. [10] A police spokesman estimated that in the week after Martinko's murder, more than 200 people responded to the detectives' appeals in the news for information concerning the case. [33] Prosecutors called a criminalist to contradict the defense's witness; the criminalist said that the storage of Martinko's clothing was not unusual. [11][18] In the year after the killing, the number of people interviewed by police reached the hundreds, and up to 30 people were interviewed under hypnosis. Visitation with the family will be Monday April 10th from 4 to 8 PM and on. He was around 25 when he killed Martinko in 1979. People around him considered him to be a professional but everything fizzled out shortly after. Turn on desktop notifications for breaking stories about interest? However, in 2006, a tip came into the Cedar Rapids police department. And the crucial link is a man named Jerry Burns. God finally won. [38] Burns is currently imprisoned in the Anamosa State Penitentiary. The organizations filing the brief contend that the collection of Mr. Burn's DNA without a warrant from a discarded straw he used at a restaurant violated the Fourth Amendment, and article I, section 8 of the Iowa Constitution. It showed that she was a distant relative of the person whose DNA was found at the crime scene a second cousin once removed. Dave Franzman, a longtime reporter at ABC Cedar Rapids affiliate KCRG, even covered the case at the time of Michelle Martinko's killing. My gut tells me there's probably something else out there. [10] Police considered the killing to be "personal in nature" based on the number and location of stab wounds. This narrowed down the possible suspects to three brothers - Ken, Don, and Jerry Burns. The images looked considerably different from the 1980 composite sketch and showed a man with blond hair and blue eyes. The police never received the information, and the woman did not contact police until months later, when they reissued a call for any information connected to the murder. Jerry Burns stands with his lawyer Leon Spies (right) during a recess in the continuation of a suppression hearing for evidence in the case of Burns of Manchester at the Linn County Courthouse in . Lives in Brentwood, Arkansas. "That threw us all off," Allison said about the incident. Tests eliminated the other two brothers as suspects, but the DNA from Burns' straw matched the blood found on Martinko's clothing. This evidence was inadmissible at trial but was the subject of a public suppression hearing. And he said he couldn't talk about it," Michael Allison said, who shared a cell with Burns starting in September 2019. READ NEXT: Serial Killers Ex Thinks There Were More Victims, Parents of Murdered Teenager Did Not Live to See Her Killer Brought to Justice, Please review our privacy policy here: https://heavy.com/privacy-policy/, Copyright 2023 Heavy, Inc. All rights reserved. Currently, in his late 60s, he is going to spend the rest of his days behind bars. He lived in Manchester at the time of his arrest in 2020 and owned a powder coating business in the city. At the time of her death, police had found Martinko stabbed to death in her car in a local mall parking lot. She was unsure her information would be of any use because she had read that the murder happened between 10p.m. and midnight, and it was 2a.m. when she drove by. Investigators also showed Burns two renderings DNA labs had supplied them of possible suspects; he questioned their likeness to him. DNA: ID. Now in his late 60s, Burns is currently behind bars and will stay there till he dies. The defense requested the case be declared a mistrial as a result, but the judge denied the request and asked the prosecutor to rephrase the question. 6931989, Anamosa State Penitentiary, 406 N. High Street, Anamosa, IA 52205. Cutting-edge DNA technology was used to solve the cold case. On December 20, 2018, a district judge set his bond at $5 million. [34], On February 24, 2020, after three hours of deliberation, the jury found Jerry Lynn Burns guilty of first degree murder of Michelle Martinko. "I asked Jerry, 'Did you do the crime?' [21] Psychics were also consulted early on in the investigation. "[2] When asked if he had killed someone that night in 1979, Burns repeatedly told investigators, "Test the DNA". The murder was closely followed within her community, and the police received more than 200 tips in the weeks following her killing. He then contacted a member of a third branch, and a DNA test determined that they were first cousins with the killer. State of Iowa. Derek Chauvin's ex-wife . Sexual Assault of Unnamed Victim (12) . I've seen several articles that said he might be tied to other murders. The company created a family tree starting with four sets of the woman's great-great-grandparents and reported that the killer was most likely descended from one of those couples. ", First published on November 6, 2020 / 8:47 AM. Her case went cold for decades until DNA testing finally brought her family some peace and put her murderer behind bars. She will be remembered as a wonderful mother and wife, loving to spend time with her granddaughter . [7] Eventually, more than 125 people would have their DNA swabbed and compared against samples taken from the scene. In December 1979, Martinko, a high school senior who was on the twirling squad at Kennedy High School in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, went to the recently opened Westdale Mall after her choir banquet at school to buy a new winter coat. Some thought that Martinko had received harassing phone calls before her death, but police stated that they did not think so. Denlinger began contacting genealogy companies for help in trying to find a family tree that could lead to the person whose DNA matched that found at the crime scene. According to the investigator, "Burns showed almost no emotion during the interview, even when he was eventually told he was being arrested. Michelle Martinko was an 18yr old student from Cedar Rapids, Iowa, USA. Burns was arrested on Dec. 19, 2018. It wasn't until decades after the killing that investigators began to link the emotions of a motive with the science of DNA. Martinko then asked another acquaintance to go to the mall with her; that friend said yes at first but later changed her mind. Burns' attorney, Leon Spies, also argued in his suppression motion that the computer evidence is irrelevant because it's from 2018 - 38 years after Martinko's death. On August 7, 2020, he was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. "It's always the boyfriend, the girlfriend, the husband someone really close to the person. He lived in Manchester at the time of his arrest in 2020 and owned a powder coating business in the city. Supreme Court No. The prosecution emphasized the unlikelihood of the DNA evidence matching someone other than the person who left it at the scene. Mason City police won't disclose whether or not they are now looking at Jerry Burns as a suspect in that case. Press question mark to learn the rest of the keyboard shortcuts. An investigator with the Cedar Rapids police department contacted DNA-tested members of two of the branches of the family tree, and eliminated those branches as containing the killer. Her friend declined. [11], In the mid-1980s, Martinko's father filed a lawsuit against the owners of the Westdale Mall and claimed negligence in not providing "reasonable security" on the night of the murder. His ex-wife, Patricia, committed suicide in 2008, and his cousin Brian Burns astonishingly disappeared. Jerry was married to his second wife at the time of his arrest. Like all the cases I cover, Michelle's was solved using forensic genealogy, which led police to Jerry Lynn Burns. On August 7, 2020, Burns was sentenced to life in prison without parole. According to Reusse, Burns would generally be a bit more careful with his language during a press conference or whenever there were cameras . Feb. 1, 2019 | The Des Moines Register. In 2018, familial DNA identified a suspect named Jerry Lynn Burns, and the case was finally laid to rest with the accused getting sentenced to life in prison without parole. 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