Jasper S. will be brought to court to stand trial for the 1999 murder of Marianne Vaatstra. The trial date is set for February 27, 2013.
Marianne Vaatstra was sixteen years old when she was found raped and murdered. On September 29, 2012, police in the Netherlands began a “DNA relationship testing” in a 5 km radius of the crime scene of approx. 8,000 men. In this study, on a voluntary basis, Dutch police studied whether there were people who had a similar chromosomal Y-DNA profile as that of the perpetrator. If so, they could try to find a match with familial DNA to trace the killer. They look for people with the same characteristics, filter the pool of people based on criminal records, add surveillance, eliminate people or zoom in on people, etc.
On November 19, 2012, police announced it had found a match. Jasper S. was arrested. He did not immediately talk to police but within 10 minutes of meeting his lawyer, he told him the truth. To be continued. Hat tip to Clouseau for keeping me posted on this case.
UPDATE: In 1999, Marianne Vaatstra was found raped-murdered in the Netherlands. Police arrested many and even held a large scale DNA search but, the perpetrator was never found. On September 29, 2012, police began a “DNA relationship testing” in a 5 km radius of the crime scene of approx. 8,000 men. In this study, on a voluntary basis, police studied whether there were people who had a similar chromosomal Y-DNA profile as that of the perpetrator. On November 19, 2012, police announced a match. Jasper S. confessed. On April 19, 2013 he was sentenced to 18 years in prison.
