DNA leads to murder charges in 25-year-old S.J. case

San Jose police announced today that they have cracked the 25-year-old unsolved slaying of a young German woman whose bullet-riddled body was found in an East San Jose carport on New Year's Day 1981.

Murder charges have been filed in Santa Clara County against Melvin Forte, 50, a convicted felon now in prison for a 1982 homicide and robbery in San Francisco, police said.

Forte is charged in the murder of Ines Sailer, 23, of Germany, who was living in San Francisco in 1980. On New Year's eve, investigators said Sailer went to a party in San Francisco. She left the party at 1:30 a.m. on Jan. 1, 1981.

Police found her body in East San Jose later that morning. She had been shot multiple times with a small-caliber handgun. Police said she was killed elsewhere.

Sailer was a kindergarten teacher who had been in San Francisco just two months before she was slain, according to a Mercury News story from 1981. Her body was found in a carport, behind an apartment complex on Poco Way, near Story and King roads. Police at the time said she was shot twice in the head and three times in the torso.

The case was unsolved until San Jose police investigators decided to conduct new scientific tests on old evidence.

``The big break was the DNA test,'' said San Jose police spokesman Sgt. Nick Muyo, referring to forensic tests that linked Forte to the victim.

Using new forensic technology, Muyo said investigators matched evidence found on Sailer's clothing and body -- police did not say what kind of evidence -- with Forte, whose DNA profile is in a state database.

Investigators said Forte visited family and friends in San Jose often between the 1970s and 1982.

The Sailer case is one of 17 cold case homicides featured in San Jose police's homicide unit Web site, ``They Are Not Forgotten,'' at http://sjpdhomicide.com.

If you have information on the Sailer case or any of the other cold case homicides, call Detective Pete Ramirez, or Detective Sgt. Tom Morales of the homicide unit at (408) 277-5283. To make anonymous tips, call Crime Stoppers at (408) 947-STOP.