The Orange County Register reported this morning that testimony by Sheriff's forensic identification technician Sandy Abrams helped a judge order a trial for the defendant in the county's oldest cold case homicide case. There was no suspect in the case until a fingerprint from the decades old crime scene was matched by new technology to the defendant.
1964 murder case to go to trial
Oldest cold case homicide probe – at 44 years – in O.C. history to result in arrest and prosecution.
By LARRY WELBORN
The Orange County Register
SANTA ANA – A 68-year-old Phelan man sat in a wheelchair without emotion Monday as he was ordered to stand trial on a charge that he bludgeoned and strangled a Santa Ana hotel manager nearly a half-century ago.
Superior Court Judge John D. Conley ruled after a two-day preliminary hearing that there is sufficient evidence to try Charles Edward Faith Jr. for the Feb. 16, 1964, slaying of Christine Elizabeth Vono Wariner.
It is the oldest cold-case homicide investigation – at 44 years – in Orange County history to result in an arrest and prosecution.
Senior Deputy District Attorney Larry Yellin contends that Faith, who was not a suspect in 1964, was matched to the fingerprints on Wariner's hotel door through advances in forensic technology.
On Monday, Sandy Abrams, a forensic identification technician for the Orange County Sheriff's Department, testified that in February 2002 she matched two bloody fingerprints left on the door of Wariner's room to Faith.
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