Victims Teree Becker (left) and Sherrie Bridgewater (right). Credit: LVMPD
On May 12, 1991, LVMPD Homicide Detectives responded to a female found deceased in her apartment in the 1000 block of West Monroe Avenue. The female was identified as Sherrie Bridgewater. The Clark County Coroner’s Office determined Bridgewater was sexually assaulted and strangled to death. The investigation eventually went cold and was assigned to the LVMPD Homicide Cold Case Team.
In 2013, LVMPD Cold Case Detectives were able to identify a suspect’s DNA profile from evidence left at the scene. The DNA profile was uploaded to the National DNA Index System (CODIS). Upon being entered into CODIS the suspect profile matched another suspect’s DNA profile from a 1975 unsolved homicide with the Westminster Police Department.
Both agencies began collaborating on the investigation. Detectives learned that on Dec. 6, 1975, police responded to the area of 100th Avenue and Lowell Boulevard in Westminster, Colorado, reference a deceased female discovered in an agricultural field. The female victim was identified as Teree Becker. Her autopsy determined she died due to strangulation and was sexually assaulted.
In 2018, following the CODIS hit, both departments started to work together to identify the suspect utilizing forensic genetic genealogy. Through the collaborative work of Parabon Nanolabs, Solved by DNA, Colorado Bureau of Investigation, Westminster Police Department, and the LVMPD, identified the suspect as Thomas Martin Elliott. In November of 1991, Elliott committed suicide in Las Vegas and was buried in a local cemetery.
With funding assistance from the Justice League and Davis Funeral Home, LVMPD and Westminster Police detectives exhumed Elliott’s remains in October 2023. A bone sample of Elliott’s remains was collected by the LVMPD Forensic Lab and submitted to BODE Technology for DNA lab work to be completed. It was later confirmed that Thomas Martin Elliott was the suspect in the 1975 murder of Teree Becker and the 1991 murder of Sherrie Bridgewater.
Republished courtesy of LVMPD.