PORTLAND, Ore. (Reuters) - Nearly four decades after a handful of young women were brutally raped and killed in the San Francisco Bay Area in crimes dubbed the “Gypsy Hill Murders,” police have charged an Oregon prison inmate with two of the deaths, authorities said on Thursday.

The inmate, 66-year-old Rodney Halbower, was extradited to California where he made an initial court appearance on Thursday and was charged with two counts of murder with special circumstances, the San Mateo County Sheriff’s Office said in a statement.

California authorities said an examination of cold case DNA profiles linked Halbower to two of the so-called “Gypsy Hill” murder victims, 17-year-old Paula Baxter and 18-year-old Veronica Cascio.

“I think it’s significant for a couple of reasons, one certainly for the families of these two young women who were killed so early in their young lives,” San Mateo County Chief Deputy District Attorney Karen Guidotti said.

“It’s wonderful to be able to, hopefully, gain some kind of closure for these families. Number two, I think it’s a testament to what modern science can do for us.”

The Bay Area was terrorized in 1976 when five women, ages 14 to 26, were killed in San Mateo County between January and April, leaving the community in fear of a serial killer on the loose.

Most of the women mysteriously went missing and were later found dead, some stabbed numerous times and sexually assaulted. Their deaths remained a mystery for four decades.

Cascio, the first victim, was found at a golf course, stabbed 30 times. Baxter, whose death was also linked to Halbower, was last seen leaving her high school only to be found dead behind a church, her clothes scattered around her, according to newspaper reports at the time.

Authorities were also investigating any connection between Halbower and two other suspected “Gypsy Hill” killings, of a 14-year-old girl and a 26-year-old woman. But prosecutors said Halbower was not linked to the death of a 19-year-old woman who was killed around the same time.

Law enforcement is also investigating Halbower as a suspect in the slaying of a 19-year-old University of Nevada student, Michelle Mitchell, who was killed in 1976 after going missing from Reno.

“At this point the investigation is focused on him,” Guidotti said.

Prosecutors said Halbower, who had been serving time in Oregon for attempted murder in a separate case, was being represented by a court-appointed attorney but could not provide his name.