SAN JOSE — The strangling death of a man inside an apartment next to Kelley Park nearly four decades ago now has a suspect, who has been arrested and charged following a cold-case investigation that matched his DNA with evidence from the unsolved homicide, authorities said.
At left is 46-year-old Jesus Ibarra, who was found dead inside a San Jose apartment in 1987; at right is Joseph Anthony Abeyta, 55, who was charged Sept. 20, 2024 in his death after DNA analysis linked him to the crime scene, authorities say. (Santa Clara Co. District Attorney’s Office)
Joseph Anthony Abeyta, 55, of San Jose, was charged with murder Friday in connection with the 1987 killing of 46-year-old Jesus Ibarra on Nordale Avenue.
A revived investigation by the Santa Clara County District Attorney’s cold-case unit and the San Jose Police Department homicide unit reportedly matched DNA from crime-scene evidence to Abeyta, who was already being held in county jail for a pending gun-possession charge and for violating his parole supervision from prior convictions in 2019.
Abeyta was scheduled to be arraigned Friday on the murder charge, for which he faces up to 25 years to life in prison if convicted.
According to investigators, Ibarra’s body was discovered, with an electrical cord wrapped around his neck, inside his Nordale Avenue apartment on April 22, 1987 by family members who had not seen him in three days. The death was declared a homicide after an autopsy concluded that he died from neck trauma.
While Abeyta knew Ibarra — a machinist and sheet metal worker — neither he nor anyone else was identified as a suspect during the initial investigation. Authorities would learn later that Abeyta lived on Peach Court, three miles north of where the killing occurred and a block away from where Ibarra’s burned-out car was found.
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Source:: The Mercury News – Entertainment
