October 17, 2012

Seattle man charged in 36-year-old Augusta murder

Police arrest Gary Raub, 63, who allegedly stabbed an elderly Augusta woman to death in 1976.

By Craig Crosby ccrosby@centralmaine.com
Staff Writer

and Betty Adams badams@centralmaine.com
Staff Writer

AUGUSTA – DNA from a homeless Seattle man's chewing gum helped lead authorities to arrest him in connection with an Augusta murder committed 36 years ago.

Gary Raub

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Additional Photos Below

COLD CASES

The following is a list of area cold cases that have resulted in a conviction:

  • Jay Stephen Mercier was indicted in September 2011 in the July 1980 murder of 20-year-old Rita St. Peter of Anson. Her body was found off Campground Road in Anson on July 5 that year. She had been beaten, her skull fractured and police said she appeared to have been run over. Mercier was a suspect from the beginning, but he was charged after DNA from fluids collected from St. Peter's body matched Mercier. His DNA was collected from a cigarette butt he smoked during an interview in January 2010. Mercier was convicted of murder last month and faces 25 years to life in prison.
  • Thomas Mitchell Jr. was indicted in September 2006 in the Jan. 6, 1983, stabbing death of 23-year-old Judith Flagg in her rural Fayette home. Mitchell -- whose father formerly owned the house -- had been viewed as a prime suspect for some time before tests linked DNA found under Flagg's fingernails to Mitchell. After a jury convicted him, he was sentenced in August 2009 to life in prison without parole.
  • Albert P. Cochran was arrested in Florida on March 17, 1998, and charged with the Nov. 23, 1976, slaying of Janet Baxter in Norridgewock. DNA testing matched semen samples found in Baxter's body and the hairs taken from Cochran. Cochran was sentenced to life in prison in 1999.
  • Michael M. Boucher Sr. was charged with murder in 1988 -- 15 years after Debra Dill, 18, of West Gardiner, was found bludgeoned to death. Her body was found on Sept. 16, 1973. State police said her car was forced off the road and into a ditch on a camp road near the Litchfield-Monmouth line. Court records in the case say Boucher told people in 1981 that he had killed Dill. He was convicted of her murder and sentenced to life in prison in July 1991.
  • Norma Small was arrested in May 2001 on a murder charge in the death of her husband, Sonny Grotton, at his home in Belfast on Dec. 16, 1983. She was charged with hiring someone to murder him and was convicted and sentenced to 60 years in prison.

 

State and Augusta police arrested Gary Sanford Raub, 63, in Seattle on Monday night and charged him with the 1976 fatal stabbing of 70-year-old Blanche M. Kimball inside her State Street home.

The Kimball murder is the oldest unsolved homicide case in state history to result in charges, police said Tuesday.

Raub was known as Gary Robert Wilson at the time of the murder and lived at Kimball's home. He is listed as a transient on the Kennebec County Superior Court complaint charging him with murder and criminal homicide in the first degree. The complaint says Raub "knowingly inflicted great physical suffering" on Kimball, a retired dental technician and practical nurse who occasionally took in boarders.

Raub -- who in a police-provided photo has a large bandage on his head and a gray beard with purple streaks -- is expected to make his first court appearance Wednesday, the first step in his extradition to Maine.

He was a suspect early in the case, but police didn't have the evidence to charge him, according to court documents.

Lt. Christopher Coleman, commander of the Maine State Police Major Crimes Unit, said the investigation turned a corner in summer 2011 when police got a tip. Though the tip wasn't helpful, the investigation that followed led to additional DNA analysis, and the murder charge against Raub.

Maine State Police Detective Abbe Chabot was assigned in 2003 as the primary investigator in the case.

Coleman wouldn't say what Raub's motive might have been. He said the two met when Raub rented a room at her house at 352 State St. There is now a parking lot where the house used to be. Kimball was never married and had no children, according to her obituary.

Police found Kimball's body on June 12, 1976, after hearing from a neighbor who had not seen Kimball in several days.

Kimball's clothing was pulled up and her body was decomposing, according to an affidavit Chabot filed in Kennebec County Superior Court.

Police theorized that Kimball was killed between June 2 and June 12, 1976, because they found a Kennebec Journal newspaper from June 2 at the scene as well as a receipt from Cottle's supermarket dated June 5.

Henry Ryan, chief medical examiner at the time, counted "23 stab wounds to the chest, two stab wounds to the abdomen, 16 cuts and lacerations to the head, and three cuts and abrasions to the hands." The cause of Kimball's death was listed as stab wounds to the heart and numerous other cuts, along with hemorrhage and shock.

Investigators interviewed Raub twice shortly after Kimball's death but he denied involvement. Coleman said Raub left Augusta shortly after the murder. Before he left, he was caught trying to break into a house near Kimball's, police said.

Police interest in Raub rekindled after he was accused in an October 2011 stabbing in Seattle that injured another homeless man.

Chabot's affidavit says blood collected from Kimball's kitchen was tested for DNA earlier this year.

"It appeared that the person who had stabbed Blanche Kimball may have sustained injuries that caused him or her to bleed, leaving possible suspect blood on various items in the living room and kitchen," Chabot wrote.

(Continued on page 2)

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Additional Photos

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Augusta Deputy Police Chief Jared Mills, left, and state police Lt. Chris Coleman answer questions on Tuesday afternoon in Augusta about the arrest in Seattle of Gary Raub, 63, who allegedly stabbed a 70-year-old Augusta woman to death in 1976.

Staff photo by Joe Phelan

 


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