On November 2, 1981, 79-year-old Ula Curdy was found dead in her Lansing home; the cause of death was ruled homicide by strangulation. The case became part of a series of violent crimes against elderly women in the area and was investigated alongside other killings.Two years later Michael Darnell Harris was charged and, in 1983, convicted for Curdy’s murder and sentenced to life in prison; he was also convicted in the deaths of three other elderly Michigan women.

Harris has maintained his innocence and challenged the evidence against him.Much later, in 2015, DNA testing on a semen stain from Curdy’s clothing excluded Harris and matched a different man who had been 13 at the time of the murder and who later acquired a criminal record. Prosecutors then ordered additional DNA testing; those tests identified Harris’s DNA on other items from the scene.

A court denied Harris’s request for a new trial and his conviction remains in place.Despite the conflicting forensic findings, key questions about the evidence handling and how multiple DNA results were reconciled remain; anyone with information about Ula Curdy or the 1981 investigation is asked to come forward?