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By ADAM BEAM
abeam@thestate.com
If it hadn’t been for DNA, the search for a suspect in the strangling of Tiffany Souers might never have ended, SLED Chief Robert Stewart said Thursday.
Authorities had leads, but no name.
But DNA in Souers’ apartment eventually led investigators to a church parking lot in Dandridge, Tenn.
Souers, a 20-year-old civil engineering student from Ladue, Mo., was partially clad when she was found May 26 on her bedroom floor a few miles from the Clemson University campus. The bikini top used to strangle her was still around her neck.
Forensic scientists at the State Law Enforcement Division built a DNA profile from evidence found at Souers’ apartment and ran it through state and federal databases, a virtual card catalog of convicted felons’ DNA profiles.
“It’s a cold hit. That means this person’s name had not come up anywhere in the investigation,” SLED Chief Robert Stewart said. “So even 10 years ago, it’s possible this case would have gone unsolved.”
Agents didn’t find a match to the DNA taken from Souer’s apartment in the South Carolina database.
But agents searched the combined DNA index system and found two matches — one in Florida and one in North Carolina.
Normally, it takes 30 days to get confirmation on a DNA test. But in Souers’ case, the results were back in less than 24 hours.
“Two or three people were working exclusively on this case,” Stewart said. “There was a lot to review.”
By Tuesday afternoon, S.C. officials knew they were looking for Jerry Buck Inman. They held a news conference at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday to announce they had issued warrants for Inman.
At 11:45 p.m., authorities pulled Inman over in a church parking lot near his home in Dandridge and arrested him. Inman is charged with murder, rape and kidnapping in Souers’ death.
Inman had been required to register his DNA in two states because of his convictions of sexually assaulting a Tampa, Fla., woman in 1987 and a fellow prison inmate in the Buncombe (N.C.) County jail in 1988.
The DNA match doesn’t mean Inman is guilty, but investigators say it puts him at the crime scene. From there, investigators work to build a case.
A FOREST ACRES CASE
In a recent Columbia-area case, DNA led investigators to Kevin Goodwin, who was convicted last month of killing a retired Forest Acres doctor.
In that case, detectives had nothing but the saliva found on a cigar butt at the crime scene. DNA from the saliva matched Goodwin’s. A sample of his DNA already was in the database from a prior armed robbery conviction.
After DNA led investigators to Goodwin, they searched his home and found several items stolen from Dillard’s house. They also matched a palm print found on a windowsill at Dillard’s home with Goodwin’s palm. After a two-week trial, jurors took two hours to convict Goodwin.
“We obviously would not have had a reason, I don’t think, to think that Goodwin had ever been to the house or at the scene,” 5th Circuit Solicitor Barney Giese said. “But for the DNA in that case ... I don’t know if you would have solved that case.”
DNA can clear as well as convict.
In 1991, 17-year-old Crystal Faye Todd was raped and murdered in Horry County. Investigators had enough evidence that they were ready to sign a warrant for a man. But after checking his DNA, they found it was impossible that he committed the crime.
SLED agents then took voluntary DNA samples from people in the community. They got a hit on Ken Register, who was a pallbearer at Todd’s funeral. He was charged and eventually convicted of the murder.
“The beauty of DNA is that it clears as many people as it convicts,” Stewart said.
SAMPLES REQUIRED
In 2000, seven states required DNA samples of convicted felons. Today, 43 states require it, including South Carolina, said Lisa Hurst, a governmental affairs consultant with the Smith, Alling, Lane law firm in Washington, D.C.
“The public perception of DNA has come a long way,” she said.
Hurst said the trend is taking samples of everyone arrested on a felony charge — not just those convicted. Seven states already do this, including California, Louisana, Minnesota, New Mexico, Texas and Virginia.
South Carolina’s database has grown by more than 30,000 samples since the General Assembly enacted a law in 2004 that requires every convicted felon to submit a DNA sample.
SLED has received 1,500 DNA samples a month since then, said Ira Jeffcoat, who runs the DNA lab at SLED.
Once SLED receives a sample, it is sent to a private laboratory for processing, which costs $25 per sample. When samples come back, SLED agents check each sample for accuracy before logging it into the system.
In the two years since the new law, SLED has caught up with the initial surge of samples, Stewart said.
However, because DNA is solving so many cases, more and more law enforcement agencies are collecting DNA and sending it to SLED for processing.
Stewart said he is hiring eight more technicians, nearly doubling the DNA staff.
Reach Beam at (803) 771-8405.
