Detective: DNA Links Tucker to Mt. Vernon Murder

A Mt. Vernon Police Detective told the jury hearing the Joe Tucker murder trial in Jefferson County Court Wednesday that DNA evidence links Tucker to the 1988 stabbing death of Jana Marie Reynolds.

Detective Roger Hayse testified the case had remained dormant for more than a decade until new testing on Reynold's clothing with an alternative light source turned up a stain that was later determined to be semen.

He says DNA testing that followed by a private company eliminated Reynold's husband and an original suspect in the case. But Hayse says when hairs taken from Tucker shortly after the murder were tested the results were a match.

At that time, a warrant was obtained for Tucker's arrest. He was picked up in Springfield, Missouri, where he had moved.

The prosecution continued to present its case Thursday. Tucker is on trial for ten counts for the first degree murder of Reynolds, who was a 22-year-old nursing student at the time of her death.