76-year-old retired carpenter facing cold case homicide charges
FAIRFIELD – A 76-year-old Fairfield man is under arrest, accused in two homicides 16 years apart.
The Solano County Sheriff's Office says DNA evidence led to James Gary's arrest in the two cold case homicides of women dating back to 1996 and 1980. He's also connected to a sexual assault in 2021.
Gary is a recent widower, and a retired carpenter living off a union pension.
CBS13's Steve Large spoke to neighbors who said they liked him.
"What kind of person did he seem like," Large asked.
"Good people, good people," neighbor Blanca Martinez said.
Gary's alleged secret predatory life just became public after DNA in a sex crime in the North Bay matched the two unsolved murder cases in 1980 and 1996, giving detectives a new witness and a new lead.
The break in the case came when investigators began following Gary seeking a DNA sample, and he happened to get pulled over for suspected DUI.
"The spout from the breathalyzer essentially was collected and sent into DOJ, and ultimately that was our main piece that was able to connect them," Solano County Sheriff Lt. Jackson Harris said.
Gary was not arrested for DUI that day, but the stop gave investigators the chance encounter they needed.
"Absolutely," Harris said. "It was, I hate to believe in luck in these type of things, but it was absolutely a nice lucky break that the circumstances presented themselves."
Detectives say Gary strangled Latrelle Lindsay in 1980 in Union City and also killed Winifred Douglas in 1996 in Vallejo the same way.
Gary's alleged 2021 victim survived a sexual assault.
"I'll just say that it takes a very unique individual that would be doing these crimes even to this age and this day," Harris said.
A life of violent crime, without a single felony charge. That is, until DNA evidence led to this arrest.
Deputies believe there is a good chance that there are more victims out there and ask anyone with information to contact them.