Cold case solved as DNA test links man originally cleared by polygraph to 1979 killing of teen girl

District attorney's office confident they've identified Esther Gonzalez's killer nearly five decades after violent death

A man who was cleared in the 1979 rape and murder of a teenage girl after passing a polygraph test has now been identified as her suspected killer due to DNA evidence, California authorities announced.

The body of Esther Gonzalez was found in a snowpack off a highway near Banning, California, on 10 February 1979. Gonzalez had been walking from her parents' home to her sister's house the previous night when she was attacked, raped and bludgeoned to death, according to authorities. She was 17 years old.