Portland Police Find Anna Maria Hlavka's Killer 40 Years Later

PORTLAND, OR – After 40 years, the family of Anna Maria Hlavka gets a measure of justice. Anna was 20-years-old when she was found murdered in the apartment that she shared with fiancee and her sister.

On July 24, 1979, Hlavka was discovered by her sister, Roseanne, who had just returned home after finishing her work.

Portland Police now say that Hlavka was killed by Jerry Walker McFadden, who was 31-years-old at the time. McFadden will not be appearing in court in related to Hlavka's murder. He was executed in Texas 20-years-ago for another murder.

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Detectives had been able to quickly that Hlavka, who had gone to her apartment at 1811 Northwest Couch after finishing her shift at McDonald's, had been sexually assaulted, then strangled with the electric cord from her clock radio.

For years, police followed leads and developed suspects only to eventually clear them.

In 2009, volunteer detectives working with the Cold Case Squad, asked the Oregon State Police Crime Lab to examine several pieces of evidence from the murder.

In a surprise to everyone, scientists at the lab discovered a "full DNA profile" of an unknown man. It was a surprise because DNA evidence tends to break down over time.

By 2016, detectives from the Cold Case Homicide Detail had submitted DNA from eight people in an attempt to find Hlavka's killer.

All came back negative.

In May, 2018, they took a new route – using the recently developed "forensic genealogy" that was receiving a lot of news at the time because of the arrest that month of the California man accused of being the Golden State Killer.

By October, investigators had hit pay dirt.

They had managed to map out three of the four family lines of the killer and soon identified him as McFadden.

Unfortunately, they soon learned that McFadden had been executed in October 1999 for killing a woman.

Detectives still traveled down to Texas to speak with members of his family.

They discovered that he had been driven to Portland by a woman he knew from his home town.

The woman said she dropped him off and never heard from him again.

DNA samples provided by McFadden's family were a match and detectives knew that they had their killer.

Officials say that he had a criminal record that spanned years.

In 1973 he'd been convicted of rape and sent to prison for 15 years, getting out in December 1978.

It's believed that he was driven to Portland some time after that.

Detectives say that in addition to killing Hlavka in 1979, he was also convicted of kidnapping and raping a teen at knife point and sentenced to prison until July, 1985 when he got out.

In May, 1986, he was charged with raping and murdering a teenage woman and shooting two other people.

While awaiting trial, he managed to escape, kidnapping a female correction officer in the process.

He held her hostage for three days, managing to stay ahead of the more than 1,200 officers who were searching for him.

At the time, it was called the largest manhunt in Texas history.

Despite his execution, detectives are still trying to track his movements while he was in Portland and ask that if anyone remembers his name or recognizes him from the above pictures, to contact Detective Meredith Hooper.

Photos via Portland Police Bureau.