In the autumn of 1987, a shadow of fear crept over the Richmond, Virginia area, a fear that would soon shatter the lives of a hardworking Korean immigrant family. Fifteen-year-old Diane Cho, a high school freshman, lived with her parents and younger brother in a Chesterfield County apartment. She was a bright and diligent student, and on the night of November 21, 1987, the familiar sound of her typing an English paper was the last time her parents would hear her alive.
The following morning, on November 22, a horrific discovery was made in the quiet of their home. Diane had been brutally raped and strangled to death in her own bedroom.
The crime scene told a chilling story. The screen to Diane's window had been cut and removed, allowing her attacker to slip into the room as the family slept. Her hands were bound behind her back with a rope, which was also tied tightly around her neck. Her mouth was covered with duct tape, silencing any chance of a scream. A strange and disturbing detail was left behind: a figure-eight or infinity symbol painted on her hip with nail polish. The community was gripped by terror as it became clear that Diane's murder was not an isolated incident but part of a string of similar attacks by a predator the press would soon dub the 'Southside Strangler.'
The investigation into Diane's murder and the other connected homicides led police to a 25-year-old Richmond resident named Timothy Wilson Spencer. At the time of the murders, Spencer had been living in a halfway house for parolees, located within walking distance of some of the victims' homes. His arrest on January 20, 1988, for another murder in Arlington, Virginia, would be the key to unlocking the identity of the Southside Strangler. A search of his belongings at the halfway house uncovered a chilling piece of evidence: a drawing of the same figure-eight symbol found on Diane's body.
Timothy Wilson Spencer was charged with the murders of Diane Cho and three other women. His trial would become a landmark case in the annals of American criminal justice. For the first time, DNA evidence was used to secure a capital murder conviction. Semen samples collected from the crime scenes provided a genetic match to Spencer with overwhelming certainty. Although the DNA evidence in Diane's specific case was noted as not being as conclusive as in the others, the totality of the evidence, including the symbolic marking, led to his conviction for her rape and capital murder. The jury handed down a fourth death sentence for the slaying of the 15-year-old girl. After his appeals were exhausted, Timothy Wilson Spencer, the Southside Strangler, was executed in Virginia's electric chair on April 27, 1994, bringing a close to a reign of terror that had claimed the life of a young girl with a promising future.
