Thirty-two years ago, a Phoenix woman was abducted and sexually assaulted. The case went unsolved, and detectives couldn’t find the man responsible before the case was no longer prosecutable in 1990. DNA analysis has linked the incident to Mark Goudeau, the Baseline Killer.

Back in 2005, the city was plagued with murders and sexual assaults, involving seemingly random victims. The man responsible is now in prison, but it looks like he was committing crimes long before 2005.

Phoenix Police Sgt. Jonathan Howard says in 2013, a cold case detective came across evidence from 1985 and submitted it for DNA testing.

“He was able to call this victim and share with her the news that 32 years later the Phoenix Police Department did not give up on her. We continued to investigate the case, we determined who it was, we brought her some closure and allowed her to move on with her life,” Howard said. 

Howard says it’s important that lab scientists preserved the evidence because if all of it had been used in the '80s, this case never would’ve been solved.

"We may be able to solve cases tomorrow with technology we don’t even know exists today” Howard said. 

In 2011, Goudeau was found guilty of nine murders and 58 other crimes. He was given nine death sentences plus 438 years in prison.