Suffolk County District Attorney Rachael Rollins announced Thursday that a convicted killer has been indicted for the 1980 rape and murder of a woman in a Boston hotel room.
A Suffolk County grand jury Wednesday afternoon returned indictments charging Steven Fike with rape and first-degree murder in the 1980 death of Wendy Dansereau.
According to Rollins' office, Fike is serving a life sentence in an Alabama prison for a 1982 rape and murder, but is currently eligible for parole.
“Dansereau was 19 years old when she was murdered, and her family has waited nearly four decades to know what happened to her,” Rollins said.
According to a statement from Rollins' spokesperson, Matthew Brelis, an employee of the Hotel Diplomat in the South End discovered Dansereau’s body inside a hotel room on March 18, 1980. Dansereau had been sexually assaulted and strangled.
The FBI’s Combined DNA Index System (CODIS) matched DNA collected during the early stages of the 1980 investigation to the defendant’s genetic profile captured in 1982.
According to Rollins' office, in addition to the DNA and physical evidence, police were able to pinpoint the defendant in New England the day before the victim’s body was found.
Rollins' office said improvements in forensics helped to identify the killer, but a team of dedicated professionals, including Boston Police Detective Jack Cronin and a civilian investigator, worked the case to find answers.
Rollins' office said they’re not aware of another older case with a living defendant, because with many other cases, the defendants are deceased.
In September, Rollins unveiled the Project for Unsolved Suffolk Homicides (PUSH), her office-wide initiative to review unsolved homicides and invest agency resources to try and solve important cold or unsolved cases.
“We may not be able to provide every family with the answers that we have found for Dansereau’s loved ones,” Rollins said, “but we will continue to work on their behalf. And we will not rest. There is no stature of limitations on murder.”
