Advances in DNA technology and a renewed investigation led to the arrest of James Vanest for the 1981 murder of Debra Lee Miller in Mansfield, Ohio.
This image provided by the Mansfield Police Department shows Debra Lee Miller, a local waitress who was beaten to death on April 29, 1981 in Mansfield, Ohio.The suspect was shot and killed in a standoff with police last month when they tried to serve a warrant in another case. Police said 68-year-old James Vanest, was responsible for the murder of 18-year-old Debra Lee Miller. Back in 1981, Miller was found dead in her downtown Mansfield apartment.
Police said they talked to Vanest, who lived upstairs, but he never was identified as a suspect. The case was reopened and reinvestigated a number of times since 1981, but investigators were not able to solve the murder. In 2021, detectives, along with DNA experts, took another crack at the case. They said improvements in technology, along with a fresh approach to the case, led them to Vanest, who had moved to Canton. Detective Terry Butler talked with Vanest in 2021 and said the man was cagey and was clearly trying to establish an alibi for himself. However, he admitted to being with Miller before her death. “Early morning of April 29th, coming back from a bar, he's saying that she invited them in. They had consensual sex,” Butler said. “We got him in the apartment that day at early morning hours of the day she was found and with his DNA markers left in the house,” Butler said. Detectives tried to talk with Vanest again in June of this year, but Vanest was uncooperative and demanded a lawyer. Shortly after, Vanest sold his home and moved. He was arrested in West Virginia and faced firearms charges there. Vanest posted bond and made his way back to Canton.
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