LUMBERTON — A St. Pauls man will go to trial April 30 on charges that he raped and murdered a 79-year-old woman 31 years ago in California.
The trial date for Kevin Ford, of 3884 W. N.C. 20, was set Thursday, according to Barbara Medina, a San Diego County District Attorney’s Office media specialist. Ford is accused in the sexual assault and death of Grace Hayden in 1987.
Ford entered a not guilty plea to the charges on July 31 and was ordered held without bail, according to Tanya Sierra, also a San Diego County District Attorney’s Office media specialist. He was ordered Nov. 2 to stand trial in San Diego by Superior Court Judge Leo Valentine Jr. The prosecutor will be Deputy District Attorney Valerie Summers.
The investigation into Hayden’s death had gone cold because of a lack of evidence, but became hot again early this year thanks to the efforts of Tony Johnson, an investigator with the San Diego District Attorney’s Office. Johnson was looking at cold cases when he ran a fingerprint found in Hayden’s home through the national law enforcement data base, which did not exist at the time of the murder. The print led to Ford.
On May 24, Johnson contacted Erich Hackney, a Robeson County District Attorney’s Office investigator, and told Hackney that Ford was a potential match. Ford was stopped for probable cause and a DNA sample was taken. Ford’s DNA sample matched DNA evidence collected in 1987 at the crime scene, according to investigators.
An first-degree murder arrest warrant was issued in California on July 3, and Ford was extradited to San Diego.
