12-07-2016, 11:25 AM
California
![[Image: Yuba%20Girls010]](http://www.sacbee.com/news/local/crime/ewbb62/picture101650822/ALTERNATES/FREE_640/Yuba%20Girls010)
On the evening of Nov. 11, 1973, 7th grade classmates 12-year-old Valerie Janice Lane and 13-year-old Doris Karen Derryberry went to the mall in Yuba, California. When they didn't return, their mothers reported them missing.
The Yuba County Sheriff's Department was notified a few hours later that two target shooters had discovered the girls' bodies along a dirt road in a wooded area near Marysville, north of Sacramento, where they had been shot at close range. The terrible crime was big local and national news at the time.
Investigators interviewed 60 potential suspects, but were unable to find evidence against any of them. So, the families were left with no answers as to who did this to their children and the case remained cold for 40 years.
Then, finally, in 2014, a cold case detective sent old DNA to the state forensics lab and it matched DNA from two men with criminal records (sex and drug crimes) to semen found on Derryberry. I love DNA forensics.
(continued)
On the evening of Nov. 11, 1973, 7th grade classmates 12-year-old Valerie Janice Lane and 13-year-old Doris Karen Derryberry went to the mall in Yuba, California. When they didn't return, their mothers reported them missing.
The Yuba County Sheriff's Department was notified a few hours later that two target shooters had discovered the girls' bodies along a dirt road in a wooded area near Marysville, north of Sacramento, where they had been shot at close range. The terrible crime was big local and national news at the time.
Investigators interviewed 60 potential suspects, but were unable to find evidence against any of them. So, the families were left with no answers as to who did this to their children and the case remained cold for 40 years.
Then, finally, in 2014, a cold case detective sent old DNA to the state forensics lab and it matched DNA from two men with criminal records (sex and drug crimes) to semen found on Derryberry. I love DNA forensics.
(continued)