Category: Local news

(VIRGINIA BEACH, Va.) — Four decades after a young woman was raped and murdered, a man has been linked to the crime through DNA and is under arrest, according to Virginia Beach, Virginia, police.

“It’s incredibly scary for the community to think that someone who would rape and brutally murder someone 40 years ago was out in society,” Virginia Beach Police Chief Paul Neudigate said at a news conference on Wednesday.

On May 15, 1986, the body of 22-year-old Roberta Walls was discovered in a field behind an elementary school, police said.

Walls “was a loving daughter, a big sister, a friend to those who knew her and someone that could be counted on in her circle of friends,” Virginia Beach Police Deputy Chief Jeffery Wilkerson said.

Her murder was investigated for decades, police said.

In 2001, a male DNA profile was developed and it was entered into the national DNA databank, but there was no match, police Capt. Michele Wyatt said.

“During the course of the investigation, the DNA of more than 30 males was compared with the offender’s DNA, and all were eliminated,” Wyatt said.

In 2023, the Virginia Beach Police Department received grant funding that allowed investigators to pursue forensic genealogy leads, Wyatt said.

Police went on to identify a “possible suspect who had strong ties to the area during the relevant time period,” Wyatt said, and a “direct DNA comparison ultimately identified Charles Berry as the source of the DNA profile.”

Investigators discovered that Berry was in the U.S. Navy during the time of the murder and was stationed in the Virginia Beach area, Wyatt said.

It appears Berry did not know Walls before the murder, police said, adding that Berry had never been on the police’s radar.

Berry, 66, of Newington, Connecticut, was arrested on Monday, the Newington Police Department said. He’s charged with rape and capital murder in the commission of a rape, the chief said.

“This breakthrough stands as a powerful testament to the relentless persistence of our detectives, who refused to let Roberta be forgotten,” the Virginia Beach Police Department said in a statement. “We hope this closure brings a measure of peace to the Walls family and sends a clear message: no matter how much time passes, we will never stop searching for the truth.”

Berry is in custody in Connecticut and it is not clear if he has an attorney, according to court records.

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(VIRGINIA) — A former assistant principal at a Virginia elementary school is standing trial on criminal charges more than three years after a then-6-year-old student shot his first grade teacher in their classroom.

Ebony Parker has been charged with eight counts of felony child abuse with disregard for life in connection with the January 2023 shooting at Richneck Elementary School in Newport News — one count for each bullet that was unspent in the gun, according to the Newport News Commonwealth’s Attorney’s Office. She has pleaded not guilty.

The criminal trial comes months after a separate jury in a civil trial found that Parker acted with gross negligence in the shooting and awarded the injured teacher, Abby Zwerner, $10 million in damages.

Prosecutors in the ongoing criminal trial allege that Parker failed to respond after several staffers raised concerns that the student, identified in the trial as JT, had a gun.

“For over an hour, multiple people went to Dr. Parker and told her there was an armed child at an elementary school,” Deputy Commonwealth Attorney Josh Jenkins said during opening statements on Tuesday. “Multiple warnings brought directly to her.”

Jenkins said the evidence will show that Parker did not say to search the child, did not call police and did not remove the child from the classroom.

“She didn’t even get up from her desk,” he said. “Warning after warning after warning — nothing.”

Jenkins said there were 19 children in the classroom at the time of the shooting who are the alleged victims in this case.

“A slight movement of the gun could have hit a child instead of Miss Zwerner,” he said. “All of them, you’ll learn, watched as their teacher clutched her chest and bled before these children, screaming in horror, ran across the hallway to another classroom.”

Jenkins claimed that Parker was the only person in the building at the time who had the authority and knowledge to respond to the crisis.

Defense attorney Curtis Rogers pushed back against that claim, arguing in his opening statement that other school staffers, including Zwerner, could have acted.

“The Commonwealth talks about, a lot, this ongoing crisis and that Dr. Parker was the only person that had knowledge of the crisis and the authority to act. I will submit that that’s not accurate. It’s not true,” Rogers said.

“Think about it — who was the one person that was there from the beginning to the end? And that was the teacher, Miss Zwerner,” he said.

Zwerner, the first witness in the trial, testified that she had told Parker prior to the shooting that JT “seemed to be off” that day and “in a violent mood.” She said another staffer, reading specialist Amy Kovac, alerted her that JT told other students he had brought a gun to school, and that Kovac reported that to the administration.

Zwerner said that in hindsight she could have separated JT from the other students and confirmed that she was responsible for the safety of her students. Though she said her understanding that a crisis or emergency needed to be brought to the attention of the administration, and that she trusted her colleagues.

Kovac testified that she told Parker that two students reported to her that JT had a gun in his bag, and that Parker nodded in acknowledgment when she said she would search the bag at recess. Kovac said she did not find a gun when she searched the bag and then told Parker that she believed the gun was in his jacket pocket.

Pressed by the defense on why she didn’t do more, such as by separating students from JT, Kovac said, “I did not know what his next actions would have been at that moment.”

“A weapon had been reported and no administrator did actions,” she said.

The criminal trial is scheduled to run through at least Thursday.

Zwerner also testified about the shooting during the civil trial, saying she “thought I had died.”

The bullet went through Zwerner’s left hand, which she had lifted, and then into her chest. She was initially hospitalized with life-threatening injuries, police said.

Parker did not testify during the civil trial.

Zwerner and Parker both resigned following the shooting.  

The student brought the gun from home, police said. His mother, Deja Taylor, was sentenced to two years in state prison after pleading guilty to child neglect in connection with the shooting. She also pleaded guilty to using marijuana while in possession of a firearm and making a false statement about her drug use during the purchase of the firearm used in the shooting and was sentenced to 21 months in federal prison.

She was released from state custody on May 13 and transitioned to community supervision, according to online Virginia Department of Corrections records.

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