A Santa Barbara County jury this week found a man guilty of a decades-old murder in Santa Maria.
On September 18, 1988, 30-year-old Ofelia Sandoval was raped and murdered. She had reportedly been strangled to death.
After about a year of investigation, her case went cold.
But in the early 2000s, according to the Santa Barbara County District Attorney’s Office, the Department of Justice was able to develop a DNA profile of an unknown male from items found in Sandoval’s room at the Town Center Motel.
While that DNA did not match any profiles in the national database at the time, further investigation eventually identified Aloysius Winthrop James as the suspect and investigators were able to match his DNA to samples recovered during Sandoval’s autopsy.
James was arrested in Georgia in April 2024.
He now faces life in prison without the possibility of parole when he is sentenced this April.
