BOSTON, Sept. 23, 2015—Suffolk County District Attorney Daniel F. Conley today delivered the following remarks on the indictment of JAMES WITKOWSKI (D.O.B. 11/27/72) for the 1992 murder of 21-year-old Lena Bruce in Boston’s South End:
“More than a quarter century ago, a young woman named Lena Bruce came to the Boston area from her hometown of Philadelphia to study at Tufts University. She graduated with honors in May of 1992, the only African American woman in her class to receive a degree in electrical engineering.
21-year-old Lena Bruce was murdered in her South End apartment in 1992. Her alleged killer has been identified and indicted more than 23 years later.
“Two months later, at the age of 21, she was murdered in her South End home. The evidence suggests she was bound with a telephone cord, sexually assaulted, and suffocated by an intruder. Her roommate discovered her body on the evening of July 12, 1992.
“Despite an extensive investigation by police and prosecutors in the days and weeks that followed, there were no witnesses and no leads. The case was highlighted in the media and by Lena’s friends and family. Even years after her death, generations of investigators continued to appeal to the public and sift through the evidence for anything that would identify her killer. Despite their best efforts, Lena’s murder went unsolved – until now.
“Earlier this afternoon, the Suffolk County Grand Jury returned an indictment charging JAMES WITKOWSKI, age 42, with first-degree murder in Lena’s homicide. Witkowski is currently in custody at the Suffolk County House of Correction on an unrelated conviction and will be arraigned in Suffolk Superior Court in the near future.
“As far as anyone can tell, Witkowski was a stranger to Lena Bruce. At the time of her murder, he had only a minor record of larceny-related offenses and there was nothing to link him to the crime. But Boston Police detectives assigned to the case collected and processed the crime scene evidence carefully. They stored that evidence under laboratory conditions for more than two decades. And as a result, we have today what they couldn’t imagine in 1992 – DNA evidence that identifies James Witkowski to the exclusion of any other suspect, recovered from two locations on Lena Bruce’s body.
“In 1998, the Boston Police Crime Lab performed DNA testing on swabs and fingernail clippings that had been recovered from Lena’s body. The samples matched each other, and this unique DNA profile was uploaded to the FBI’s Combined DNA Index System, or CODIS, where it remained on file.
“Last summer, as a result of a probation violation on a 2013 assault and battery conviction in Dorchester, Witkowski was sentenced to 18 months in the Suffolk County House of Correction. And because of felony convictions for uttering and possession of a Class B substance with intent to distribute, he was ordered to give a DNA sample. That sample was also uploaded to CODIS, and in January it ‘hit’ on the unknown crime scene sample submitted some 16 years previously.
“We sometimes hear of a ‘flurry’ of activity following a break in a case. This break led to a blizzard. Some 58 exhibits went before the grand jury. Investigators travelled to multiple states, interviewing and re-interviewing witnesses. The Crime Lab re-tested evidence – including a wallet found outside Lena Bruce’s building on the night her body was discovered. Inside was one slip of paper with one fingerprint that the BPD Latent Print Unit matched to James Witkowski’s left thumb.
“With a job offer from one of the country’s premier engineering companies, Lena’s future looked bright. She moved to Boston’s South End, where she was intent not just on doing well for herself, but on doing good for others. Growing up in Philadelphia, she had volunteered with the elderly and with troubled teens. She was extremely active in her community, and even today, young women attend college thanks to a scholarship in Lena’s name through her sorority, the Xi Tau chapter of Delta Sigma Thi. In every way, Lena Bruce was just the kind of person we want in our city. Had she been allowed to grow into a successful woman, there’s no telling what she would have accomplished.
“Sadly, Lena’s parents passed away before we could inform them that their daughter’s killer had finally been identified. And it’s in light of this fact that I want to urge anyone with information on an unsolved homicide to share it with investigators. This case was made in large part because of DNA technology that was simply unavailable to the first generation of investigators. But we know that any number of modern murder investigations are one witness away from being solved – all it takes is one person to step up and tell us what they saw, what they heard, and what they know. Don’t let another parent go to the grave waiting for answers.
“I’d like to ask Commissioner Evans to say a few words as well, on behalf of the Boston Police Department.”
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All defendants are presumed innocent until and unless proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.
