Police Name Suspect In 1965 Killings

SAN DIEGO -- El Cajon police announced Tuesday that they believe they have solved two murders from 37 years ago.

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Police Say DNA Helped Name Suspect

Along with the FBI, and other agencies, they have arrested former Lakeside resident Clyde Wilkerson, 63, in Arkansas in connection with a murder that took place in 1965.

The first victim was Cheryl Burnett, a 19-year-old divorced mother of a small boy. Police said she was strangled and sexually assaulted in her apartment on Leslie Road in El Cajon.

Some 19 days later, police say Wilkerson was responsible for another break-in just a few blocks away on Chambers Street. Louis Mercer, 62, was beaten to death. His wife, Lola, was also beaten and assaulted but she survived.

Police said they were faced with a very cold case file -- the crimes occurred more than 37 years ago. But evidence was saved, and modern DNA technology was put to work to help find Wilkerson, according to FBI special agent William Gore.

"We were able to get saliva samples -- unbeknownst to him -- from envelopes taken from his workplace," Gore said.

The bodies of the victims were then exhumed for more evidence, 10News reported.

Wilkerson has been in and out of prison all over the country since he was first a suspect in the murders in 1965.

District Attorney Paul Pfingst told reporters that he believes Wilkerson would have been caught in 1965 had DNA technology existed.

However, he was hard to catch at the time, officials said, because the victims were apparently selected at random.

"Wilkerson's usual method of operation was to enter the victim's residence through a window or sliding door. He usually surprised the victims from behind or from the cover of darkness," El Cajon Police Chief James Davis said.

Detectives and a prosecutor in Arkansas are working on bringing Wilkerson back to the area to stand trial for crimes they believe he committed there.

If Wilkerson is found guilty of the murders, he will not face the death penalty, officials said.

There was a death penalty in California when the murders were committed, but it was overturned before being reinstituted in the 1970s. The District Attorney's Office is investigating just how severe a sentence Wilkerson could face.