The murder of Laura Kempton
Portsmouth, Rockingham County, New Hampshire · 1981
Overview
Laura Kempton, a 23-year-old Portsmouth Beauty School student, was found beaten to death in her ground-floor apartment at 20 Chapel Street in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, on the morning of September 28, 1981 by a police officer who had come to serve a parking summons. She had been bound with cords and sexually assaulted, and she died of massive trauma to the left side of her head. Investigators recovered a male DNA profile from evidence at the scene but pursued hundreds of leads over four decades without identifying her killer. In 2021 and 2022 the Portsmouth Police, the New Hampshire and Maine forensic laboratories, the Attorney General's Cold Case Unit and the genetic-genealogy firm Identifinders International used forensic genetic genealogy to trace the crime-scene DNA to Ronney James Lee, a security officer who had been 21 at the time. Lee had died of acute cocaine intoxication in 2005, so no arrest or prosecution was possible. On July 20, 2023 the New Hampshire Attorney General and Portsmouth Police announced the case resolved and closed, naming Lee as the man responsible.
How it was solved
Portsmouth Police preserved biological evidence from the 1981 scene, and over the following decades that evidence was retested as DNA science advanced. A partial male profile was developed from a thigh scraping at Cellmark Diagnostics in 2000, and in 2002 the Maine State Police Crime Laboratory, working from vaginal swabs and a cigarette butt, developed a fuller profile that analyst Cathy MacMillan concluded came from a single man. Conventional database searches over the years returned no match. In September 2021 a team from the Portsmouth Police, the New Hampshire State Forensic Laboratory and the Attorney General's office met to pursue forensic genetic genealogy using whole genome sequencing. In May 2022 the firm Identifinders International uploaded a profile to a third-party public genealogy database; Portsmouth Detective Erik Widerstrom was notified, and within days a relative with ties to Rockingham County was identified. Genealogists traced the biological parents, whose only son was Ronney James Lee. MacMillan compared a blood card preserved from Lee's 2005 autopsy to the crime-scene DNA and it matched; in June 2023 she confirmed Lee's profile against the cigarette butt, the thigh scraping and a pillowcase. Because Lee had died in 2005, the Attorney General announced on July 20, 2023 that the case was closed with Lee identified as the perpetrator, and said that had he lived he would have been charged with first-degree murder.
Sources
- Resolution and Closure of the 1981 Murder of Laura Kempton in Portsmouth, New Hampshire
“Mr. Lee died of acute cocaine intoxication at the age of 45 on February 9, 2005 ... No arrest will be made, and no prosecution commenced, however, because the perpetrator died in 2005.”
- Anatomy of a cold case, solved: How Portsmouth police tracked down Laura Kempton's killer
“At 9:25 a.m. on September 28, 1981, Officer Ron Grivois arrived to serve a parking violation summons ... her ankles tied with white electrical cord ... a telephone cord wrapped around her neck ... MacMillan compared Lee's blood card from his autopsy to the vaginal swab DNA - it matched.”
- Suspect identified in 1981 killing of a New Hampshire woman with help of genetic genealogy, attorney general says
“Laura Kempton, then 23 ... discovered in her apartment ... died of massive trauma to the left side of her head ... identified the suspect as Ronney James Lee.”
- Decades-old New Hampshire cold case murder solved through genetic genealogy, officials say
“He was 21 years old at the time of Ms. Kempton's homicide. Mr. Lee died of acute cocaine intoxication at the age of 45 on February 9, 2005.”
- A New Hampshire beauty school student was found dead in 1981. Her killer has finally been identified.
“Laura Kempton, 23 ... a Portsmouth Beauty School student ... found by a police officer attempting to serve a court summons for parking ... male DNA profile extracted from a cigarette butt, pillow, and glass bottle.”
- New Hampshire cold case murder solved through genetic genealogy
“In May 2022, Portsmouth Police Detective Erik Widerstrom was notified that a profile uploaded to a third-party public genetic genealogy database ... Identifinders International ... determine that those parents had exactly one son - Ronney James Lee.”
- Police: Ronney James Lee killed Laura Kempton, beaten to death with wine bottle in 1981
“In June 2023, an analyst confirmed Lee's DNA matched biological material from a cigarette butt, victim's thigh scrapings, and sperm on a green pillowcase found on the victim's head.”
- New Hampshire Makes Breakthrough in 40-Year-Old Murder Mystery
“Decades-old murder of 23-year-old Laura Kempton in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, solved through forensic genetic genealogy; suspect Ronney James Lee died in 2005.”
- Laura Kempton's cold case murder in Portsmouth NH solved with genetic genealogy, AG says
“New Hampshire Attorney General John Formella: 'It's important for us to send a message to the public that we never stop working' on terrible crimes.”