Suspect in 1997 Bethany death returns to face trial
A Houston man suspected of killing multiple women has been brought to Oklahoma to face prosecution in a 1997 Bethany slaying.
Earlier this year, William Lewis Reece, 57, helped Texas investigators find two sets of female remains south of Houston, authorities said. Reece has been imprisoned in Texas since 1998 on an aggravated kidnapping conviction.
Reece made his first Oklahoma court appearance Tuesday by video from jail. He was booked into the Oklahoma County jail Monday evening.
Reece was charged in September with firstdegree murder and kidnapping in the strangulation death and abduction of Tiffany Johnston. The 19-year-old newlywed was abducted July 26, 1997, from a Bethany car wash, police reported.
Advancements in DNA testing linked Reece to the 1997 cold case, according to the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation.
The two sets of human remains found in Texas were identified in April.
One set of remains found at a dig site in Brazoria County was identified as Kelli Ann Cox. Police in Denton, a city in north Texas, said Cox was identified through dental records.
Cox, a 20-year-old student at the University of North Texas, disappeared from Denton on July 15, 1997.
The other set of remains was identified as Jessica Cain, a 17-year-old girl also missing since 1997.
Reece hasn’t yet been charged regarding those cases, but reportedly cooperated with Texas authorities to avoid the death penalty. Oklahoma prosecutors haven’t said whether they will seek the death penalty.
Reece also has been a suspect in the April 1997 death of Laura Kate Smither, 12, of Friendswood, Texas. He was never charged.
Records show Reece was sentenced to 60 years in prison for the May 1997 abduction of Sandra Sapaugh in Webster, Texas. Sapaugh, a girl about Johnston’s age at the time, told authorities she was forced at knifepoint into his truck. She later was able to escape after jumping from the moving vehicle.
Reece was in prison from 1987 to 1993 in Oklahoma for first-degree rape, records show.
Reece has pleaded not guilty in the Johnston murder case.