Killer Identified In 1979 Murder Of Texas Girl Last Seen Leaving Community Pool

In September 1979, Lesia Michell Jackson, 12, was sexually assaulted and murdered in Texas. Unfortunately, her case went cold, and her killer remained unidentified for decades. Now, over 40 years later, the man who murdered her has finally been identified as Gerald Dewight Casey.

Jackson disappeared on Sep. 7, 1979, after she spent the day playing at the Lake Wildwood pool in her neighborhood. She was last seen walking home. When she never arrived, her family contacted the police, and law enforcement conducted an extensive search.

The child’s glasses were found at a local intersection the next day. Then, on Sep. 13, 1979, she was found dead in a “heavily wooded area along a pipeline near Exxon Road”, according to a statement by the Montgomery County Sheriff’s Office (MCSO). Her autopsy showed that she had been sexually assaulted and murdered.

The MCSO Cold Case Homicide Squad took over the investigation of Jackson’s murder in 2005, and they were able to utilize new forensic technology to help solve it. In fact, a new technology called the “M-Vac” processed DNA samples that were retrieved from Jackson’s clothing. It helped identify that a Conroe man named Gerald Dewight Casey was the murderer. A blood sample match from Casey that was obtained in 1989 also confirmed he was the killer.

Investigators soon discovered that Casey couldn’t be prosecuted for the murder, though. He had already been executed by lethal injection on April 18, 2002, for another murder he committed in 1989 in Montgomery County.

According to KHOU, in the 1989 murder, Casey and an accomplice beat and shot Sonya Lynn Howell nine times as they attempted to steal guns from Howell’s home. Casey was convicted of capital murder and sentenced to death.