4 years ago
Could the person who killed Joan Diver be the same person who may have attacked eight other women between 1986 and 1994, including UB student Linda Yalem?
Amherst and Erie County investigators say they have to acknowledge the similarities but, they're waiting for results from DNA and other tests.
They won't draw a hard line between the so-called bike path rapist in Amherst and the murder of Joan Diver in Clarence.
There are some similarities to the two cases. Investigators now say Joan Diver died from blunt force trauma and ligature strangulation. UB student Linda Yalem, who died during her 1990 attack on the Ellicott Creek bike path, also died from ligature strangulation.
There have also been nine other unsolved attacks from 1986 to 1994 across western New York where the victim was caught in a remote area alone, attacked from behind, using something like a cord or clothesline to control her and in some cases bring the victim in and out of consciousness.
In some cases, tape was used on the victim's face. Still, sheriff's officials are not ready to link the Clarence attack, yet. "It could be a copycat or it could just be something completely different from that, so there's nothing right now that we can say definitively links it to that. there are similarities, obviously," says Erie County Undersheriff Richard Donovan.
They are still awaiting DNA test results. Six of the past nine unsolved cases , including the Yalem murder, are linked through DNA.
