Convicted double murderer and diagnosed sexual sadist Mitchell Gaff was captured and ultimately convicted after detectives in Washington state used a covert "gum ruse" to secretly obtain his DNA, solving two cold case killings dating back more than four decades.
Prosecutors said Gaff, 68, was sentenced this week in Snohomish County Superior Court to 50 years to life in prison after he pleaded guilty to the murders of Susan Vesey and Judith "Judy" Weaver, who were killed in separate attacks in the early 1980s.
Court documents describe Gaff as a sexual sadist and note he had a history as a convicted serial rapist before he was formally linked to the homicides through DNA, according to NBC News.
DNA From the Crime Scene
Investigators reopened the cases after DNA recovered from the Weaver crime scene produced a profile that was entered into the national Combined DNA Index System, or CODIS, which flagged Gaff as a possible match based on prior samples in the database.
Detectives with the Everett Police Department then focused on confirming that match with a fresh, surreptitiously obtained sample, according to an arrest affidavit.
To secure that new DNA without tipping him off, three undercover officers approached Gaff at his home in Olympia in January 2024, posing as market researchers promoting a new chewing gum, dressed casually in shorts and T‑shirts to make the story believable, investigators said.
They asked him to participate in what appeared to be a flavor "taste test," handing him individually wrapped pieces and providing small lidded cups where he was told to discard each chewed sample, ABC News reported.
Once the officers left, the discarded gum was rushed to a state crime lab, where analysts extracted DNA and compared it with genetic material preserved from the Vesey and Weaver investigations.
The profiles matched, and detectives said the results gave them the probable cause they needed to arrest Gaff in May 2024 on two counts of aggravated murder and related sexual assault charges.
According to police and prosecutors, Gaff later admitted in court to raping and strangling both women, as per the New York Times.
