Patrick Nicholas, 55, was arrested last week and accused of murdering Sarah Yarborough in 1991

Teen With 'Big Dreams' Was Strangled With Her Stockings 30 Years Ago, and Suspect Was Just Arrested

On a cold Saturday in 1991, Sarah Yarborough drove to her high school in Washington state to meet her drill team to head to a competition later that morning.

The 16-year-old was never seen alive again.

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Now, nearly 30 years later, thanks to advances in DNA and genetic genealogy, authorities believe they have found the man who beat and strangled the teen to death with her own stockings.

On Wednesday night, Patrick Nicholas, 55, of Covington, was arrested at a bar in Kent in connection with her death and charged the next day with first-degree murder, authorities announced at a press conference on Thursday.

Image zoom Patrick Nicholas of Covington, Washington King County Sheriff's Office

“Few things in law enforcement are more rewarding than informing a parent you believe you have solved the murder of their child,” King County Sheriff Mitzi Johanknecht said.

“Last night our detectives were able to tell Sarah Yarborough’s parents the news they waited to hear for 28 years.”

Hesitantly stepping up to the microphone, Sarah’s mother, Lori Yarborough quietly thanked detectives for never giving up “even when I had given up. I would just say if you are going to do something heinous don’t do it here, because they will come and get you.”

Image zoom Lori Yarborough at the press conference about the arrest of a suspect in her daughter’s 1991 murder King County Sheriff's Office

Her daughter’s death became known on the morning of Dec. 14, 1991, when two 12-year-old boys saw a man coming out of the woods outside Federal High School in Federal Way, a coastal city near Tacoma, at about 8 a.m. and found Yarborough’s body, the sheriff said.

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Police at the time had no suspects, though they were able to create sketches based on the boys’ observations of a man with long hair and recover DNA evidence to establish a profile, the sheriff said.

Though more than 4,000 tips came in over the course of the investigation, “None of the tips identified the suspect,” Kings County Detective Kathleen Decker said at the press conference.

The field of genetic genealogy at the time was non-existent, so the case remained dormant.

Over the years, though, Decker said she had DNA evidence reexamined several times based on advances in technology.

She began working with a forensic genetic genealogy company, and last month, the genetic genealogist assigned to the case “contacted me with a promising lead,” Decker said.

Authorities were alerted to a person of interest: Nicholas, who lived in King County, court documents said, local station KREM reports.

Detectives began surveilling Nicholas, who smoked a few cigarettes outside a strip mall and threw the butts on the ground along with a napkin, court documents show, The Seattle Times reports.

They submitted the items to the state crime lab to compare the DNA on the items to DNA found at the scene nearly three decades earlier. The DNA on the cigarettes matched that from the crime scene.

During the investigation, authorities learned that Nicholas had been arrested 1994 just three years after Yarborough’s murder, the sheriff said.

He was charged with child molestation and subsequently pleaded guilty to fourth-degree gross misdemeanor assault, according to court documents, ABC News reports.

On Thursday, a tearful Lori Yarborough, told reporters she was surprised that her daughter’s alleged killer has been caught.

“It seemed unbelievable to me that he would still be around,” she said, KREM reports.

She still thinks about her daughter every day. “She loved life, she loved people, she loved to travel,” the mom said. “She had big hopes and big dreams and was a great sister and a great daughter.”