Photo: Spokane County Sheriff’s Office
Police believed they solved a decades-long murder mystery last week, but when they went to arrest the suspect they learned he had died days before.
Prior to his death, in an April 2018 interview with police, Pierson denied killing Fielding.
Fielding, then 31, was reported missing in August 1967, and her badly decomposed body was discovered eight months later in a shallow grave near Spokane.
“The case had remained unsolved since that time,” the statement said.
However, the investigation was reopened in April 2018 after the Major Crimes Unit received a call inquiring about the case involving Fielding’s death.
Further investigation led detectives to believe Fielding’s murder occurred in the same area as two other cold case deaths.
In September 1967, 33-year-old Sandra Pierson, the suspect’s pregnant wife at the time, died in what was initially ruled a suicide, though the victim’s children believe their father was involved in their mom’s death.
• Want to keep up with the latest crime coverage?Click hereto get breaking crime news, ongoing trial coverage and details of intriguing unsolved cases in the True Crime Newsletter.
“With these similarities, Detective Keyser began reviewing all three cold cases and worked to obtain additional information. This led to Friday’s arrest warrant for Pierson charging him with the murder of Fielding,” the statement on Monday said.
In April 2018, Detective Keyser visited Pierson’s home in Alabama to interview him, and Pierson denied involvement in Fielding’s death.
“Pierson admitted to dating thousands of women, and if he had dated Fielding, the relationship lasted no more than a week,” Keyser said.
source: people.com
