Candy Rogers.Photo: Spokane police department
A 62-year-old mystery of who raped and killed little Candy Rogers has been solved in the state of Washington — and authorities there confirm that it was the killer’s own daughter who helped solve the decades-old cold case.
Candy, 9, vanished on March 6, 1959, while selling mints in her Spokane neighborhood. A member of the Camp Fire Girls, she was out selling the candies to raise money for the youth group.
Detectives were never able to identify any potential suspects, and for decades, the case stayed cold.
Luckily, the original investigators preserved a semen sample that had been lifted from Candy’s clothing. That DNA evidence was tested earlier this year, and, thanks to advancements in the science, three brothers were identified as possible matches.
In time, through the process of elimination, John Reigh Hoff was identified as the prime suspect.
Hoff, who died from suicide in 1970, was 20 at the time of the abduction, rape and murder.
Spokane authorities reached out to Hoff’s daughter, identified only as Cathie, “and upon learning the nature of the inquiry, she dropped everything and met with detectives,” a press release explains.
“Hoff’s daughter submitted a DNA sample which was analyzed,” the release continues. “The results showed it was 2.9 million times more likely that Hoff’s daughter’s DNA was related to the recovered specimen than the general population.”
A warrant was subsequently issued allowing investigators to exhume Hoff’s remains — which were interred at the same cemetery where Candy’s body was buried.
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Once exhumed, a DNA sample was taken from the corpse, and after analysis, it was confirmed the sperm found on Candy’s clothes belonged to Hoff.
The news that her father killed Candy made Cathie both sad and angry.
“He was evil,” she said, before referencing his suicide — which occurred when she was Candy’s age. “It wasn’t an escape, in a way, from it, but he got to die with people thinking he was an upstanding man. And he wasn’t.”
source: people.com
