Oklahoma prosecutors charge convicted rapist with murder in 37-year-old cold case

Thomas Levering, 62, was charged Tuesday with kidnapping, raping and strangling Jerry Ann Watson, 38, whose decomposing body was found Dec. 30, 1975, in a wooded area in far northwest Oklahoma County.

Watson had been strangled with a piece of nylon hosiery, police reported.

Shortly after her disappearance was reported, officers found Watson's unlocked car parked at Penn Square Mall.

A couple told police they last saw her Dec. 8 at Crossroads Mall.

A girl discovered her purse Dec. 14 inside a trash bin in the 4800 block of Classen Boulevard.

Levering is serving six life sentences for sexually assaulting a woman inside his apartment, court records show.

Watson's sister contacted Oklahoma City police detectives in March and asked if the case could be reopened, according to a probable cause affidavit.

A fingerprint taken from the victim's car in 1975 was identified as belonging to Levering, and his DNA cannot be eliminated from the “slides taken at the time of her autopsy,” according to the affidavit.

First Assistant District Attorney Scott Rowland said DNA evidence coupled with new scientific technology used to test the evidence made the 37-year-old case “viable.”