Cigarette Butt Leads to Teacher’s Killer Over 50 Years Later

For over five decades, the Burlington Police Department has remained stumped by the mystery of who brutally beat and sexually assaulted a 24-year-old elementary school teacher before fatally strangling her inside her apartment.

On Tuesday, the department announced they have finally cracked the state’s oldest cold case, revealing that Rita Curran’s killer was none other than her next-door neighbor, William DeRoos. During a press conference, police said they used DNA from a discarded cigarette butt found at the scene to identify DeRoos as the culprit of the July 20, 1971, slaying that at one time was linked to notorious serial killer Ted Bundy.

Acting Police Chief Jon Murad said that in July 1971, DeRoos, then 31, lived upstairs from Curran with his wife of only two weeks. The night of the murders, Murad said the newlyweds got into an argument and DeRoos left for a “cool-down walk”—though his wife later provided her husband with an alibi when he was questioned by police.

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