Boone Co. Sheriff's Office ID's Suspect in 1976 Murder Case

The case was reopened in 2017.

Photo by the Boone County Sheriff's Office.

(Boone County, Ky.) – The Boone County Sheriff’s Office has closed a cold case from 1976.

Carol Sue Klaber was 16 years old when she was found brutally murdered in a roadside ditch along Chambers Road in Walton on June 5, 1976.

On Wednesday, the Boone County Sheriff’s Office named Thomas W. Dunaway, originally of Park Hills, as the suspect in the murder case.

The initial investigation showed that Klaber died from blunt force trauma with evidence of strangulation and sexual assault.

Kentucky State Police worked the investigation for nearly a decade before it went cold.

In 2017, the Boone County Sheriff’s Office Cold Case Unit was established and Klaber’s murder investigation was reopened that same year.

Detectives learned that evidence of the suspect’s DNA was collected in 1976 as well as the suspect’s fingerprints. Two credible suspects were later targeted but were forensically ruled out.

Last September, through a partnership with Othram Inc. of Houston, Texas, the Boone County Sheriff’s Office sent off a DNA extract developed from the 1976 crime scene. Othram scientists used Forensic-Grade Genome Sequencing to build a comprehensive DNA profile for the unknown suspect that helped detectives positively identify Dunaway.

According to the Sheriff’s Office, Dunaway was 19 years old when he murdered Klaber. He would develop an extensive violent criminal history and died in 1990 at the age of 33.

Detectives also believe that Dunaway shot Ronald Townsend on December 17, 1976. Townsend passed away from injuries sustained on December 21, and Dunaway was arrested days later on unrelated charges of Arson and Possession of an Illegal Firearm (sawed off shotgun).