PALOS VERDES ESTATES, CA — The Los Angeles County District Attorney’s office has filed a murder charge against a registered sex offender who was arrested last week in connection with an unsolved 1980 rape and murder.
Related: Cold Case Update: Sex Offender Arrested For Allegedly Killing Teen Girl 36 Years Ago
Robert Yniguez, 65, has been charged with one count of murder with the special circumstance allegation of murder during the commission of a rape — which makes him eligible for the death penalty. Authorities stated that Yniguez was “angry, but not surprised,” when they arrested him.
65 yr old Robert Yniguez arrested in 1980 murder of Teresa Broudreaux. LASD says DNA cracked the case. Story at 6pm @nbcla pic.twitter.com/4M3pzet4CM
— Angie Crouch (@AngieNBCLA) September 30, 2017
The nude body of Teresa Broudreaux, 20, was found on the morning of March 4, 1980, on a rocky beach in Palos Verdes Estates, California. Police said Broudreaux, who was pregnant at the time and had a four-year-old daughter, died of blunt-force trauma to the head.
Related: Detectives Who Cracked A 30-Year-Old Cold Case Share Secrets Of The Trade: Murder Book
Detectives took a fresh look at the cold case in 2013. By using technology that was not available at the time of the murder, authorities were able to link DNA evidence found on her body to Yniguez.
Yniguez had a conviction for rape in the 1980s, and served time in prison, Sheriff’s Detective Ralph Hernandez said. He was arrested in 1981 and suspected of sexually assaulting a young woman, but the charges were dropped when the woman stopped cooperating.
Yniguez was arrested again the next year and served eight years in prison after being convicted of rape. According to detectives, since he got out of prison Yniguez has married and been employed as a construction worker.
Related: Stay-At-Home Mom Turned Private Investigator Helps Solve Best Friend’s Cold Case Murder
“I’ve waited a long time for this day,” Broudreaux’s husband, Ronnie Fematt, said during a news conference held Friday to announce the arrest. “It has been a long time, what I’ve been through, the uncertainty of not knowing why or how.”
Fematt said that he and Broadreaux got into an argument on the night she was killed, and she went to stay at her sister’s house — but never arrived.
For almost 40 years, Fematt said he has endured gossip from people who believed that he killed his wife.
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Read more:
Los Angeles Times
Main photo: Teresa Broudreaux [Handout]
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