[1][5][6], Michelle Marie Martinko (October 6, 1961 December 19, 1979) was born in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Investigators also showed Burns two renderings DNA labs had supplied them of possible suspects; he questioned their likeness to him. County, FL. "Murder at the Mall: The Michelle Martinko Case," reported by "48 Hours" contributor Jamie Yuccas, airs on Saturday, August 7 at 9/8c on CBS. Works at Target Distribution Center. [2][3][4] Burns was arrested and, on February 24, 2020, was found guilty of first-degree murder in the death of Martinko. He said Burns had no memory of being at the crime scene. The victim, Martinko, was an 18-year-old high school student from Cedar Rapids, Iowa, who was visiting a mall to buy a winter coat. [2] That narrowed the suspects down to a set of three brothers, who had grown up in Manchester, Iowa. 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. A hearing over whether to allow the evidence at trial continued Thursday for a second day. She was a beautiful singer, and I miss all this. Jerry Burns. [2], Martinko's father, Albert, died in 1995. Family and friends of Jerry Burns are seated in the courtroom at a sentencing hearing for Jerry Lynn Burns at the Linn County Courthouse in Cedar Rapids on Friday, Aug. 7, 2020. 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 death was ruled a suicide. He is survived by his wife, Lydia Lynn; his oldest son, Scott Lynn; and his ch [21] Psychics were also consulted early on in the investigation. Be the first one to comment on this story. Kayla Lemieux, the transgender high school teacher in Canada, has been put on paid leave after pictures emerged of her dressed as a man proving she does not wear the prosthetics all the time. They also played a later recording, after Burns' arrest, in which Burns questioned whether he could have blocked out the memory of committing the crime.[30]. He would have been around 25-years-old when he killed Michelle Martinko in December of 1979. He began to search for her, as did the police. Turn on desktop notifications for breaking stories about interest? The family of Jerry Burns would like to thank our friends and the Manchester community for the support we have received since Jerrys arrest, read the familys statement. v. Jerry Lynn Burns. Denlinger said no. And he said he couldn't talk about it," Michael Allison said, who shared a cell with Burns starting in September 2019. Authorities said Burns was last seen at his 1381 180th St. residence in Delaware County on Thursday, December 19 . Authorities believe Burns stabbed the Kennedy High School senior in the chest and face inside a car parked at Westdale Mall in Cedar Rapids. Jerry Burns . He said he remembered the case from seeing it in the news, but didn't know Martinko and didn't have anything to do with it, Denlinger testified. Burns was arrested on Dec. 19, 2018. In fact, his father Harvey, now 85, had been one of the original officers on the case 40 years earlier. / CBS News. People named Jerry Burns. See if it is.. To learn the entire story of Michelle Martinko's murder, watch Dateline: Unforgettable at 10 pm on Oxygen 79. I've been reading up on this case and was wondering if they profiled this guy? 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 Cedar Rapids on Thursday, Jan. 16, 2020. The murder of Michelle Martinko in the parking lot of Cedar Rapids' Westdale Mall has some eerie connections to the Huisentruit case. The lab determined that the DNA collected from Burns was a match to DNA from the blood found on Michelle Martinko's clothing and was consistent with the DNA profile developed from blood found elsewhere in the car, Jerman said. Over 40 years ago, teenager Michelle Martinko was stabbed to death outside a mall in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. After reading about the Golden State Killer case in 2018, in which serial killer Joseph James DeAngelo was finally caught through a long trail of DNA, Denlinger had an epiphany: perhaps he could use that same new technique to solve the Martinko case. [2] A police spokesman said that "everyone's instinct is to say it was a guy", but they were not sure of the sex of the killer. Her friend declined. He was around 25 when he killed Martinko in 1979. They then used genealogical data as well as a covertly collected DNA sample from Burns to positively identify him, authorities said. Jerry Lynn Burns (born December 23, 1953 [13]) was 25 years old when he killed Michelle Martinko in December 1979. The Delaware County Sheriff said it did review the case after Burns' arrest and "feels that was clearly the case.". The black dress Michelle Martinko was wearing when she was murdered was sent to the lab for testing. Be the first one to comment on this story. Dave Franzman, a longtime reporter at ABC Cedar Rapids affiliate KCRG, Michelle Martinko's high school friend, Elizabeth Laymon, told The Des Moines Register. So Denlinger drew up an elaborate genealogy chart going back to Brandy's great-great grandparents to sleuth out a trail that could lead to the killer's DNA. A few days later, the Saints fell. DAVENPORT, Iowa (KWWL) - State prosecutors called a former cellmate of Jerry Burns in his murder trial, which continued Tuesday in Scott County. The case was appealed and was eventually decided by the Iowa Supreme Court in favor of the mall owners. Jerry Lynn Burns, 64, was arrested on Wednesday after police said he was linked by DNA from blood found on Michelle Martinko's clothing and elsewhere in the car at the crime scene. She had been stabbed 21 times in the face, neck, and chest. We would also like to extend our sympathy to the Martinko family.. Ken and Don were not a match but Jerry Burns' DNA was a match, to an almost perfect scientific certainty. Denlinger then told him he had a search warrant for his DNA. The murder was closely followed within her community, and the police received more than 200 tips in the weeks following her killing. The company also produced approximations of how the man would have aged in the years since the crime. He stated that Burns' DNA could have been at the scene due to secondary transfer (such as skin cells transferring to an article of clothing when someone brushes up against another person), although he clarified that it was not his opinion that this was the case with Burns' DNA. He lived in Manchester at the time of his arrest in 2020 and owned a powder coating business in the city. Jerry Lynn Burns will raise two . 20-1150). At the time of his arrest, Burns ran a powder-coating business called, Advanced Coating Concepts. During the investigation, the police assumed that there were personal motives involved in the murder due to the nature of Martinko's stab wounds. Jerry Lynn Burns, the suspect in the 1979 murder of Michelle Martinko, makes a court appearance via video in Linn County, Iowa, Dec. 20, 2018. "I was speechless," Denlinger says, recalling the moment the lab told him the results. [12], In 2017, a company specializing in DNA phenotyping was hired to create additional images of the killer based solely on DNA clues about facial appearance and ancestry. This narrowed down the possible suspects to three brothers - Ken, Don, and Jerry Burns. Jerry Lynn Burns was arrested in the 1979 killing of Michelle Martinko. 2. His first wife, Patricia, died by suicide in 2008. At 4a.m., police found the Martinko family's tan and green 1972 Buick Electra in the northeast corner of the mall parking lot by a JCPenney. The Delaware County Sheriff's Office says Brian Burns remains an active missing person case but, at this point, has no link to his cousin. Your login session has expired. Burns' defense team objected to the wording of one of the prosecution's questions, which they claimed implied unequivocally that Burns' blood had been at the scene. Police covertly obtained Burns' DNA from a drinking straw he left it on a table after eating lunch Oct. 29, 2018, at the Pizza Ranch in Manchester, testimony showed. The Vikings organization is mourning the loss of the innovator, colorful . Burns' wife, Patricia, died by suicide in . His voice was always turned up to full volume. Almost 40 years later, with the help of DNA Technology, the culprit was nabbed and justice was finally served to Martinko and her grieving family. But then Denlinger's supervisor, who had been listening to the recorded interview from across the street with other officers, sent Denlinger text message telling him to arrest Burns. He grew up in Manchester, Iowa, and graduated from West Delaware High School in 1972. Exactly 39 years after Michelle Martinko's body was found, DNA evidence led to the arrest of a Manchester man who was charged with her 1979 murder. This evidence was inadmissible at trial but was the subject of a public suppression hearing. She claimed to have seen two cars in the lot, one of which was Martinko's, and a man standing next to the open driver's side door of Martinko's car. On August 7, 2020, he was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. Martinko, an 18-year-old high school student, was found stabbed to death in her family's car in the parking lot of a local mall, where she had gone to buy a new coat. [2][23] On December 19, 2018, investigators went to Burns' business in Manchester, Iowa, to interview him. The trial for Jerry Lynn Burns, who's been charged with first-degree murder in the 1979 killing of Michelle Martinko, will begin at 9 a.m. Oct. 14 at Linn County Courthouse, according to online court records and the Des Moines Register. 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. Did you listen to the DNA: ID episode on the Martinko case? or. Denlinger had to consider that Michelle could have been murdered by a stranger. [16] Based on cash found in Martinko's purse, police concluded that she had not been robbed. 2020 CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved. However, the case gradually grew cold as the investigation stretched on. A composite sketch of the suspect was released in June 1980 with the help of two witnesses. ABC News' Matt Foster and Ahmad Hemingway contributed to this report. Prosecutor Nick Maybanks/Cedar Rapids Police Department, "Murder at the Mall: The Michelle Martinko Case,". [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. The final nail in the coffin was when a witness gave his statement to the court. [31] The defense argued that DNA evidence had been mishandled,[31] and that different articles of clothing from the scene should not have been stored together in one evidence bag. Spies asked if he had consent from Burns to take the lunch straw for testing. I couldnt have said it better myself, and Im the podcaster! Michelle Martinko was an 18yr old student from Cedar Rapids, Iowa, USA. What began to turn the case around was the emergence of DNA as a forensic tool for crime fighting in the late 1990s. A spot of blood on the dress had a full male DNA profile and was consistent with the male DNA profile found on the gear shift. December . Born in 1953, Jerry Lynn Burns grew up in Manchester, Iowa, and graduated from West Delaware High School in 1972. Even though the police were tipped over 200 times in the weeks following the murder, the case eventually grew cold as investigations stretched on. 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. 39 years later after the murder, a person named Jerry Lynn Burns was arrested in Manchester, Iowa, and charged with first-degree murder. Burns' wife, Patricia . Burns argues the trial court erred in denying his motion to suppress where the warrantless extraction of his DNA profile violated his rights under the Fourth Amendment of the United States Constitution and article I . Sonny arrives at his restaurant and gives Dex, who is there, the night off. GEDmatch returned one person who shared DNA markers with the suspect in Martinko's murder, and it determined her to be likely the killer's second cousin once removed. It was a cold case until 2018, when familial DNA identified a suspect 39 years after the crime who was charged, tried and convicted of her murder.[2]. People around him considered him to be a professional but everything fizzled out shortly after. [2][4][27], In pretrial hearings, Burns' attorneys claimed that police needed a search warrant to gather his DNA from the discarded straw, but the judge determined that discarded property cannot reasonably be considered private. 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