Cold case team arrests Heerlen man for raping young woman in Nijmegen in 1994
The cold case team of the Oost Nederland police arrested a 58-year-old man from Heerlen on Monday for raping a young woman in Nijmegen over 30 years ago. He was arrested based on a DNA match, the police said.
The woman was walking to work early one morning in January 1994 when a man she did not know grabbed her, threatened her, pulled her into a bush, and raped her. This happened in the Dukenburg district of Nijmegen, just out of sight of other road users.
The woman went to the police immediately after the rape. The police launched an investigation, securing trace evidence and speaking to witnesses. Investigators identified a suspect in 1994, but the trace evidence excluded him as the perpetrator and the case remained unsolved.
This year, the cold case team again picked up the case and compared the DNA traces secured in 1994 to DNA in the police’s criminal database. That led to a match with the Heerlen man. He’s been in the DNA database since 2014 for another crime he committed.
The police arrested the man on Monday. He is in custody for questioning.
