Florida police believe they’ve solved the cold case of an unnamed woman discovered dead in the woods five decades ago.
On July 19, 1972, the previously unnamed woman was discovered dead near a highway in Hernando County, Florida, draped in a hotel-style twin-size blanket.
Police had no clear leads and were unable to identify the body, let alone determine who had killed her.
Fifty-two years later, things have changed.
Florida police revealed Thursday that they had solved the murder of Peggy Joyce Shelton, whom they believe was murdered by her ex-husband Jerry Lee Fletcher, a guy responsible for some deaths across numerous states and a probable serial killer.
Fletcher died in prison in 2014 while serving a term on unrelated murder charges, a decade before he was identified as his wife’s murderer, but Hernando County Sheriff Al Nienhuis said at a press conference on Thursday that he is nevertheless relieved to have solved the long-running cold case.
“The justice he’s faced now is with his Creator,” Nienhuis added. “It’s not going to be by a man-made court system.”
According to the sheriff, Shelton and Fletcher married in 1971, but because she had no criminal record and had never been reported missing, authorities were unable to locate her for years.
Fletcher’s family ran a motel in Tampa from 1970 to 1973, where he formerly lived.
Fletcher was arrested in 1972 for abducting and raping a 16-year-old girl, but he was later declared not guilty.
He eventually left Florida and married another woman in 1973, not disclosing his previous marriage to Shelton on official documents.
Fletcher murdered another 13-year-old girl the next year while working as an industrial painter at a Caterpillar factory in Illinois.
Fletcher raped and strangled her before leaving her body in a cemetery wrapped in a hotel-style blanket, but this time he was apprehended and imprisoned.
In 2011, a Pinellas County detective discovered a DNA match between Fletcher and a similar crime: the rape and murder of 14-year-old Gina Justice, who went missing in 1971.
Fletcher informed an investigator who visited him in prison to investigate that he was involved in another homicide in Florida, but he refused to provide any other information. Two prior wives of Fletcher told police investigating the case that he was abusive and violent, and they were afraid he would murder them.
In 2013, he pleaded guilty to the Justice killing.
By then, forensic technology had progressed enough for detectives to re-investigate the Shelton case.
Her body was unearthed in 2015 for DNA testing, and by 2024, authorities had successfully matched her remains to a living relative.
“We never give up, and these things take time,” Nienhuis said during the news conference, adding that Fletcher may not technically be classified as a serial killer.
“We don’t want them to take 52 years, but we have to play the cards we’ve been dealt. In 1972, we discovered a body in the woods wrapped in a blanket, which was a challenging case to investigate in the 1970s. It’s a little simpler to solve today, but it’s still really complex, and the sooner we get those leads, the easier it will be to solve.”