A man who was shot and killed last month as authorities tried to indict him on federal weapons charges has been identified as the killer of an 18-year-old Ohio woman in a case that had gone unsolved solve for 43 years, the police announced on Monday.
Mansfield Police Chief Jason Bammann said the cold case of Debra Lee Miller, a local waitress who was beaten to death with an oven grill in her apartment on April 29, 1981, has been reopened in 2021 to take into account advances in DNA technology and forensic investigation techniques.
“They looked at the case as if it happened yesterday, with a whole new lens,” Bammann said in one press conference. “Their findings were surprising.”
The chief said a “firm DNA profile” of James Vanest, then 26-year-old Miller’s upstairs neighbor, emerged from evidence left in the room. Vanest had been questioned but never identified as a suspect during the initial investigation, which was mired in allegations of possible police misconduct.
Miller was one of several people in the Mansfield area whose suspicious deaths were examined in the 1980s for possible links to Mansfield police officers.
A special investigation ordered by the mayor concluded in 1989 that there was no evidence linking either officer to the deaths, but the report raised questions about sexual involvement between police officers and homicide victim Miller and about the way the police investigated some homicides. The report noted that Miller wrote in her diary that she was sexually involved with several Mansfield police officers.
Mansfield Police Department via AP
The local police chief retired in January 1990, after further allegations were made of alleged irregularities in the investigation into the death of the ex-wife of a Mansfield patrolman.
Miller’s case was reopened several times over the next several years. This time, Richland County Prosecutor Jodie Schumacher said the DNA evidence against Vanest was strong enough that her office was preparing a case against him for the killing to take to a grand jury.
But the case could never be brought.
Police had found Vanest living in Canton, about 100 miles (160.93 kilometers) east of Mansfield, in November 2021 and interviewed him again about Miller’s murder. He admitted he had lied to investigators during his first interview in 1981, and investigators sensed this time that he was trying to create an alibi to explain the presence of his DNA in Miller’s apartment, Bammann said.
Mansfield Police Detective Terry Butler requested a second interview in the spring of 2024, but Vanest refused to talk and asked for an attorney. Authorities said he later sold his house in Canton, bought a pickup truck and trailer and fled to West Virginia. He left several firearms at his home in Canton and was arrested in West Virginia with two others. He was arrested on state charges and released on bail.
The federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives took over his case and later indicted him on federal gun charges. On Nov. 18, U.S. Marshals and the Canton SWAT team attempted to serve Vanest with that charge at a hotel where he was being held.
“It is our understanding that when confronted by marshals and the Canton Regional SWAT team, Mr. Vanest pointed a gun at them and barricaded himself inside the hotel,” Bammann said. “After a brief shootout, a Canton SWAT member was shot in the arm and Mr. Vanest was shot.”
The officer who was shot, Patrick Lewis of the North Canton Police Department, spoke to CBS affiliate WOIO after the incident.
“After about 30 seconds to a minute, of trying to find him, I heard a gunshot and felt an instant pain in my right arm,” Lewis told the station. “The situation was so chaotic. There were still shots being fired. So when I saw the bleeding coming out of my arm, I knew I had to put a tourniquet on.”
The chief said the department considers the case closed and hopes identifying Miller’s killer will bring closure to his family.
Butler said his great-uncle was one of the first officers on the scene of Miller’s slaying in 1981. He said he feels fortunate to have the opportunity to solve a homicide that happened when he was just 10 years old . People should know, he said, “we don’t give up, we keep digging.”