MOUNTAIN VIEW — Authorities have revived the homicide case of Laurie Houts — found strangled near her Adobe Systems workplace three decades ago — citing newly analyzed DNA evidence they hope will secure a conviction of the man who was prosecuted twice in the 1990s but was freed after both trials ended with hung juries.
John Kevin Woodward, 58, was arrested Saturday as he arrived at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York after traveling from the Netherlands, where his online training company, Readytech, is based. The company also has an Oakland office.
The news was met with both gratitude and somberness by Houts’ younger sister, Cindy, who last saw Woodward walk out of court 26 years ago.
“I was thrilled and very excited,” said Cindy, who asked that her last name not be used out of privacy concerns. “Then you come down off that. Nothing is going to bring your loved person back. They’re gone. Even if it feels good in a way to have justice, it doesn’t cure the problem. It’s not like if you win, you get your sister back.”
Woodward was prosecuted unsuccessfully in 1995 and 1996 in the killing of the 25-year-old Houts, with juries hanging 8-4 and 7-5, both in favor of acquittal. During those trials, the evidence was deemed by jurors and defense attorneys as insufficient, with most of it being circumstantial besides indeterminate fingerprint samples.
Both trials included controversy, both because of the perceived weakness of the evidence and the prosecution alleging that Woodward, who is gay, was jealous of Houts’ relationship with Woodward’s male roommate. The two roommates did not have a romantic relationship, and the alleged motive was criticized by Tom Nolan, the first trial’s defense attorney, as homophobic. A judge disallowed the romantic jealousy theory from being introduced during the second trial.
The landscape appears to have changed: Monday, both the Santa Clara County District Attorney’s Office and Mountain View Police Department said that DNA from the crime scene, Houts’ car, was reexamined, including the rope found around Houts’ neck.
In an investigative summary accompanying the latest murder charge, police wrote that a DNA sample collected from the rope in 2005 — the case had been periodically revisited by cold-case detectives — was analyzed by the county Crime Lab using Y-STR analysis of paternal male chromosomes. That reportedly yielded a match to Woodward, and also excluded Houts’ boyfriend.
Additionally, police wrote that the lab determined in a new examination “that fibers from sweatpants inside Woodward’s car were virtually indistinguishable from fibers found on the murder weapon (rope) around Houts’ neck.”
Houts died after leaving work at Adobe Systems on Charleston Road on Sept. 5, 1992. Her body was found in her car about two miles away on Crittenden Lane. The inside of the car showed signs of a physical struggle, and police recovered her unopened pocketbook nearby.
When Woodward initially came under police suspicion, he participated in a monitored call with Houts’ boyfriend, and “did not deny” killing Houts, and asked “what evidence the police had against him and suggested they meet in a parking lot to discuss the matter,” according to the police summary.
Mountain View police, led by Detective Sgt. David Fisher, began reexamining the case in late 2020, and a murder charge was re-filed earlier this year.
“We looked deep at every single option we had,” he said.
But the status of the case then hinged on locating and arresting Woodward, who had since relocated to the Netherlands. On Saturday, after being alerted by Homeland Security, DA investigators traveled to New York and arrested Woodward as he arrived. Within 24 hours, Dutch authorities, working with the Justice Department, served a search warrant at his home and business in the Netherlands.
Woodward is in jail in New York. Monday, authorities said he waived extradition, meaning that Mountain View police has until July 29 to escort him back to Santa Clara County, where he will be formally booked and arraigned.
“The DA’s office is thrilled that we have an opportunity, after 30 years, to seek justice for Laurie, her family and friends,” Cold-case prosecutor Rob Baker said.
Also having lived through the two prior mistrials, Marilyn, Houts’ best friend, is optimistic but cautious about the prospect of a new trial: “All we can do is hope.”
Marilyn says she can’t help but think of what Houts could have accomplished as a pioneering UC Davis-educated female computer engineer, just as the historic Silicon Valley boom was taking shape.
“She was succeeding in a career dominated by men,” said Marilyn, who also asked that her last name be withheld. “She would have been there with all of them.”
In the meantime, Cindy and Marilyn are seeing the revival of Houts’ case as an occasion to honor her life and legacy. Part of that is through the Houts Memorial Girls Athletic Scholarship at San Jose’s Gunderson High School, her alma mater where she was a three-sport athlete, headed by a love of basketball. The scholarship benefits graduating female seniors who participated in sports all four years and plan to pursue a degree in science, technology, engineering or mathematics.
“Although she was only 5 feet tall, she had a huge heart and her humor and spunk were endearing to all,” reads a family statement. “The way Laurie lived and treated people was a stunning example of what was right in the world.”
Source: www.mercurynews.com