Pennsylvania Police solve 58-year-old cold case

US: On March 18, 1964, Marise Ann Chiverella left for school, carrying canned goods to give to her teacher, a nun at St. Joseph’s Parochial School in Hazleton, Pennsylvania.

Marise, 9, who aspired to be a nun, hurried from her home to bring the gifts to her classroom and still get to morning Mass on time.

For members of her family, those were the last memories they had of Marise, who was found that afternoon in a pit used for refuse. She had been sexually assaulted and killed.

Nearly 58 years later, the Pennsylvania State Police have identified the man they say was responsible for her death.

“Pennsylvania State Police was founded in 1905, so over half of our existence we’ve investigated this case,” Lt. Devon M. Brutosky said at a news conference Thursday in which investigators unraveled the decades-long search for the killer.

Brutosky said investigators used DNA tests and genealogical research to identify James Paul Forte, who was then 22, as the person who killed Marise. He lived six or seven blocks from Marise, police said, but they did not know of any connection he had to her or her family.

Officials said Forte was 38 when he died of natural causes, possibly a heart attack, in the bar where he worked in 1980. He was still living in Hazleton, a former coal mining town nearly 100 miles northwest of Philadelphia, and, as far as Police knew, unmarried. – INDIAN EXPRESS