Convicted Felon Charged In 1975 Murder Of Oklahoma Woman

There are new developments in a cold case in 1975.

A hunter discovered the body of a missing woman in northwest Oklahoma County in 1975. Now, more than 35 years later, investigators say they solved the case. Prosecutors charged a convicted felon with the murder late Tuesday afternoon.

Thirty-eight-year-old Jerry Watson went missing in December 1975. Her body was discovered in a wooded area near Edmond Road and Rockwell two weeks after her disappearance. Detectives found her strangled with the nylon stockings she once wore.

"I felt like she was cheated," Lucille Roscoe, Watson's sister, said.

Roscoe says through the years the family never gave up on finding her sister's killer.

"It's just that sometimes it's hard to go back," Roscoe said.

She found the courage to do so in 2012.

"I decided that maybe we should call them and just see if anything has been done on her case," Roscoe said.

Oklahoma County's Cold Case unit responded using science not available back in 1975. Prosecutors say investigators matched DNA evidence to Thomas Levering, a convicted rapist, who in the 70s abducted two young women from and near Crossroads mall. Levering raped them in the country and tied up the victims with panty hose, circumstances similar to those in Watson's case. Roscoe responded to the news.

"If they can prove the DNA evidence and show it and convince me then I will be thrilled to death," she said.

Court records show Watson also disappeared from Crossroads Mall and later found murdered in the country. Prosecutors allege fingerprints and the semen analysis will prove Levering raped and then killed Jerry Watson.

Levering is currently serving eight life sentences for the rape cases from the 70s. He is also convicted in a rape case from 2011, a crime he committed while out of prison on parole. Life in prison is the maximum sentence Levering could receive if convicted of the murder