Suspect Initially Cleared by Polygraph Now Linked to 1979 Murder of Teen
In 1979, the body of a 17-year-old girl was found dumped in a snowpack off Highway 243 near Banning. Authorities determined she had been raped and bludgeoned to death.
Now, more than 45 years later, using forensic genealogy, the Riverside County Regional Cold Case Homicide Team announced today, Nov. 20, 2024, that they have confirmed the identity of the rapist and killer.
On Feb. 9, 1979, Esther Gonzalez was attacked and murdered while walking from her parents’ house in Beaumont to her sister’s house in Banning. Her body was found the next day off Highway 243, south of Poppet Flats Road.
Esther’s body was found after an unidentified man, described by deputies as argumentative, called the Riverside County Sheriff’s Station in Banning to report finding a body, saying he didn’t know if it was a male or female. Five days later, sheriff’s investigators were able to identify the caller as Lewis Randolph “Randy” Williamson and asked him to take a polygraph. He agreed and passed which, at the time, cleared him of any wrongdoing.
Investigators continued to work on this case for years and eventually uploaded a semen sample from the crime scene into the Combined DNA Index System (CODIS). In 2023, members of the cold case homicide team sent various items of evidence to Othram, Inc. in Texas, initiating a Forensic Investigative Genetic Genealogy investigation, in hopes of developing additional leads. Earlier this year, a crime analyst assigned to the cold case team determined that, although Williamson was seemingly cleared by the polygraph in 1979, he was never cleared through DNA because the technology had not yet been developed.
