Terrance Arndt was 18 when he was shot and killed on December 14, 1984, while parked in his parents’ car on a wooded lovers’ lane near Burney High School. He had been sitting with an 18-year-old female friend when a man approached and fired through the driver’s side window, striking Arndt twice. After the shooting the assailant forced the woman out of the car, led her up a hill, and sexually assaulted her; she later drove the car to town for help.

The case remained unsolved for more than a decade until Thomas Elmer Brewster was arrested in 1995. Prosecutors alleged Brewster committed both the murder and the sexual assault, but he was exonerated at trial in 1997 when DNA testing on the victim’s blouse—held by police since the murder and not tested until the defense requested it—proved he was not the perpetrator. Brewster later received a federal settlement from Shasta County.

Arndt’s parents, Keith and Judy Arndt, continued to hope forensic advances might one day identify the killer, but the family endured long-term grief and frustration. If anyone has information about the December 1984 shooting near Burney High School, please share what is known.