A Georgia man has been arrested and charged with the 1985 murder of a couple at a church after the original suspect was cleared by DNA evidence, authorities in the state said Tuesday.
Erik Kristensen Sparre, 61, was arrested in the murders of Harold and Thelma Swain, police authorities in Georgia said.
Sparre was arrested nearly four decades after the couple were shot to death inside the Rising Daughter Baptist Church in coastal Camden County.
The man became the focus of a new investigation into the Swains' deaths after authorities concluded they had initially charged the wrong man.
Dennis Perry was sentenced to life in prison when a jury convicted him in 2003 of the Swains' murders. He spent two decades in prison before a Superior Court judge ordered a new trial in 2020.
The judge dismissed all charges against Perry in 2021 after prosecutors asked to dismiss the case.
Investigators and the courts reconsidered the case after attorneys with the Georgia Innocence Project tested DNA from hairs found on the hinge of a pair of eyeglasses left with the victims’ bodies.
They said the DNA matched Sparre, who had already been considered a suspect, and not Perry.
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported, meanwhile, that Sparre’s alibi that he was working at a grocery store when the murders occurred could not be true.
The newspaper also cast doubt on Perry’s conviction, noting that jurors were never told that a key witness had been offered a $12,000 reward before testifying.
