Terrence Miller Wiki – Biography
Terrence Miller, The suspect of a 48-year-old murder died by suicide just hours before a jury found him guilty.
The man accused of killing a 20-year-old Washington state woman in 1972 killed himself Monday as a jury was deliberating his fate, officials said.
Terrence Miller was found guilty of murder Monday afternoon in the death of Jody Loomis, according to the Snohomish County Superior Court clerk’s office. The jury was not told during their deliberations that Miller was believed to be dead.
Terrence Miller Age
Terrence Miller has died at the age of 78-years-old.
Cause of Death(Suicide)
Terrence Miller, 78, was found dead in his home on Monday morning when Snohomish County Sheriff’s deputies responded to a report of a death by suicide in Edmonds, Washington.
Miller’s manner of death was ruled a suicide, and his cause of death was a gunshot wound, the Snohomish County Medical Examiner confirms to PEOPLE.
Miller died by suicide as jurors were weighing his case after a two-week trial, and he was convicted just hours after he was found dead on Monday, according to the Herald.
Who Was Jody Loomis
The man accused of killing a 20-year-old Washington state woman in 1972 killed himself Monday as a jury was deliberating his fate, officials said.
Terrence Miller, 78, was found guilty of murder Monday afternoon in the death of Jody Loomis, according to the Snohomish County Superior Court clerk’s office. The jury was not told during their deliberations that Miller was believed to be dead.
Miller, of Edmonds, was arrested last year after he was connected to the case using a DNA sample from a discarded cup. Police said he lived about five miles from where Loomis’ body was found.
He had been free during the trial on a $1 million bond.
Prosecutor Craig Matheson told CNN that authorties regret the way the matter ended, but added, “We got an answer, whether Mr. Miller was there or not. It does not diminish the verdict.”
Matheson said the Loomis family was informed of the death, and their reaction was “stoic.”
DNA Evidence Broke The Case
The case dates to August 1972, when Loomis, 20, left her home and rode her bicycle toward a stable to ride her horse. Her body was found disrobed and shot in the head in the woods, authorities said.
The case was unsolved until the recent emergence of genetic genealogy, which is a combination of traditional DNA evidence with the type of genealogic analysis made famous by companies such as 23andMe and Ancestry.
Previously, DNA evidence from the crime scene could only be compared to a specific suspect or put into limited national databases to find direct matches.
But with genetic genealogy, that same DNA evidence can be put into the free website GEDMatch, which then shows a list of extended family members who are related to the perpetrator. That allows investigators to begin zeroing in on those who may have had close contact with the victim based on other public information.
The field has allowed law enforcement to crack cases that had long frustrated investigators, such as that of the Golden State Killer.
Investigation
Last year, investigators matched Miller’s DNA, which was collected from a coffee cup, to semen found on the young woman’s boot using genetic genealogy, the Seattle Times previously reported.
“I’m glad that we got to hear the verdict,” said lead investigator Jim Scharf of the Snohomish County sheriff’s office, per the Herald. “I think that was good for the (Loomis) family.”
A follow-up hearing has been scheduled for December 17 to determine whether Miller’s family should pay fines.
Prosecutor Craig Matheson said, “I think we should put this to bed properly,” while Miller’s public defender Laura Martin said there would be “no public benefit in the court actually proceeding to take the verdict in this case, because you cannot sentence Mr. Miller.”
