ALAMEDA — Police here say they’ve not only identified the badly decomposed body of a woman that turned up along the shoreline in July, but arrested a suspect who has been booked on murder charges after a Thursday morning raid.
The suspect, identified through jail and court records as 42-year-old Joseph Roberts, has been charged with murder and booked into Santa Rita Jail on a no-bail hold. He is set to be arraigned Friday morning in Dublin, records show.
The badly decomposed body of the victim, identified by police as 27-year-old Rachel Elizabeth Imani Buckner, was found inside a plastic bag on the shoreline near the Bay Farm Island Bridge in Alameda. The grisly discovery was made on July 20 by a dog who led his owner to the bag. The owner cut the bag open and notified police, authorities say.
The charging records allege Roberts killed Buckner on or about July 13, and police determined her body was dumped no later than July 18, authorities say. Police haven’t disclosed the motive nor said how Roberts was identified as a suspect, but say both Roberts and Buckner lived in Pleasanton and were in a dating relationship.
Buckner’s was decapitated and her body had been badly mutilated, in addition to decomposition and water damage, police say. Roberts was arrested Thursday morning by a task force headed by the U.S. Marshals Service.
Source: www.mercurynews.com