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On December 14, 1991, 16-year old Sarah Yarborough left her house to go to Federal Way High School in Federal Way, Washington. She was meeting the rest of her drill team to get on school buses to head to a competition. As Sarah’s classmates arrived at the school and began boarding the bus, Sarah was noticeably missing from the team, she never made it on the bus.
A little after 9:00 a.m., two 12-year old boys spotted a man emerging from the bushy hillside right behind the school. Once the man was out of sight, the boys approached the hillside and spotted the lifeless body of a young girl dressed in her drill team uniform.
The two boys discovered the body of Sarah Yarborough.
Sarah’s body was discovered in a bushy area next to Federal Way High School about 150 yards away from her parked car. She had been beaten and strangled to death and there were signed that she had been sexually assaulted.
The discovery of Sarah’s body triggered an instant manhunt for her killer. Her story gained a lot of media and community attention. Her murder seemed random and senseless.
With Sarah’s killer at large, the community was scared. People were afraid to go out at night. Kids started walking in groups.
After Sarah’s murder, over 2,500 tips poured into the King County Sherriff’s Department, but even with the amount of leads, police didn’t have a possible suspect or any persons of interest.
Investigators recovered one very important piece of forensic evidence. They recovered a full male DNA profile from Sarah’s clothing. The DNA came from a semen sample of the suspect. The DNA profile was run through CODIS, our national DNA database, but didn’t produce a hit.
That’s when weeks turned into months, and months turned into years in the investigation. Years would go by with only a handful of people emerging as possible suspect’s in her murder. Sarah’s classmates went on to graduate high school, to attend college, and start careers of their own.
It was Sarah who was frozen in time.
The only physical description they had of the killer was that he was in his late teens, early 20’s, with shaggy, dirty blonde hair and blue eyes. With this physical description, a forensic sketch artist created a composite sketch of the suspect. The sketch didn’t produce any solid leads in the case.
The case remained active, unsolved, for the next 28 years.
By 2018, the initial composite sketch needed to be updated because their suspect would be almost 30 years older. Investigators partnered with Parabon NanoLabs, a private lab in Virginia to replace the composite sketch with a new age-professed portrait of the suspect. They used a technique called “polymorphism” which takes DNA markers from the suspect to envision what he would look like now.
The new age-progressed portrait didn’t lead to any arrest in the case.
Investigators started searching through ancestry websites to solve the decades old cold case. They were searching for any DNA profile related to Sarah’s killer. Many law enforcement agencies were using a method known as genetic genealogy to solve their cold cases.
Genetic genealogy involves comparing DNA from a suspect to members of their family.
In October 2019, genealogists assigned to Sarah’s case zeroed in on two brothers who were identified through genetic genealogy. The DNA of these brothers was found to be a relative of the suspect.
One of the brothers was ruled out by DNA from a prior rape conviction. His DNA was already compared through CODIS to the DNA found on Sarah’s clothing.
The other brother was not ruled out.
The second brother was Patrick Nicholas. In 2019, he was 55-years old but back in 1991 at the time of Sarah’s murder he would have been 27 years old. Nicholas served time in prison for a 1983 attempted rape, but never submitted his DNA into CODIS. He has another 1993 arrest for child molestation, a case he plead guilty to the lesser charge of 4th degree gross misdemeanor assault. Just like before, he was not required to submit his DNA into CODIS.
Investigator’s on Sarah’s case surveilled Nicholas and waited for him to drop a cigarette in order to collect a DNA sample. The DNA sample was compared to the semen sample from 1991. The DNA was an exact match.
Patrick Nicholas was Sarah Yarborough’s killer.
In October 2019, Patrick Nicholas was arrested and charged with first degree murder for killing Sarah in 1991. The case was solved almost 3 decades later.
Justice was finally served for Sarah through the advancements in genetic genealogy.
Episode Sources:
ABC News Article dated 10/4/19
The News Tribune Article 10/3/19
Crime Watch Daily video
Kiro 7 article 10/22/19
Federal Way Mirror Article dated 10/4/19
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