MONROE COUNTY, Georgia — An arrest has been made more than 30 years after a 23-year-old woman was killed in Central Georgia, according to the Monroe County Sheriff's Office.
On Tuesday, Nov. 21, 1989, a body was found by deer hunters in the Johnstonville Road area near I-75. They later identified the woman as 23-year-old Mary Louicile Willfong. She had been sexually assaulted and strangled to death.
Tips came in that Willfong had been spotted in Forest Park, Georgia, at a farmer's market getting into a tractor-trailer with a white man.
Investigators interviewed several suspects and took DNA from them. The case went unsolved and was eventually closed.
In March 2019, Sheriff Brad Freeman reopened the case. Investigator Marc Mansfield took the original evidence and re-submitted it to the GBI crime lab, where new technology was used.
They identified a suspect through genealogy traces and assistance from Special Agent Tim Burke with FBI Atlanta.
59-year-old Larry Padgett was arrested in Loogootee, Indiana, on Wednesday and was charged with murder.
While in Indiana, investigators gathered additional evidence linking Padgett to the murder of Willfong.
Padgett is set to arrive in Monroe County in the next few hours. He has waived extradition and is on the way to the jail.