First-of-Its-Kind Move 19 Years Ago Just Paid Off

California's first 'John Doe' warrant based on DNA just resulted in arrest of rape suspect
By John Johnson,  Newser Staff
Posted Jul 2, 2019 2:05 PM CDT
Prosecutors Made a Move 19 Years Ago. It Just Paid Off
Mark Manteuffel.   (Sacramento County District Attorney's Office)

Back in in the 1990s, prosecutors knew the same man had raped three women in California, but they had no idea who he might be. They did, however, have a sample of his DNA, and just two days before the statute of limitations was to expire in 2000, prosecutors obtained the state's first "John Doe" arrest warrant based on DNA, reports the Sacramento Bee. Two decades later, they have arrested a 59-year-old retired corrections officer named Mark Manteuffel. He is accused of raping three women in the Sacramento area between 1992 and 1994 and now faces a slew of charges, including rape and torture with the use of a knife. Manteuffel, who had since moved to Decatur, Georgia, is in custody and awaiting extradition to California, reports the Atlanta Journal Constitution.

“For 19 years we waited to put a face to that DNA profile,” says Sacramento County District Attorney Anne Marie Schubert, per NBC News. “For the victims in this case, they have waited well over two decades to put a face of the man who sexually assaulted them.” Authorities haven't provided exact details, but they zeroed in on Manteuffel thanks to genetic testing companies—the same way they caught "Golden State Killer" suspect Joseph James DeAngelo. Manteuffel worked for the federal Bureau of Prisons for years and even served as a criminal justice lecturer at California State University, Sacramento. (DNA also may have cracked the 1987 murder of a Canadian couple.)

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