As a hunter lined up in position to shoot his gun at the target, something caught his eye. It was approximately 11:00 a.m. on August 31, 2003, when the sharpshooter spotted something strange near the old city dump east of Las Cruces, New Mexico. As he walked closer, he quickly determined it was no piece of garbage. The object he had seen was the body of a partially-clothed woman.

Later that day, twenty-two-year-old New Mexico State University graduate student Katie Sepich was reported missing. She was identified as the victim.

Like many parents of slain children, Katie’s parents became crusaders for justice. Their efforts have resulted in major legislation being passed by the majority of the states.

Katie Sepich

The eldest of Dave and Jayann Sepich’s three children, Katie had recently graduated college with a degree in Marketing and was about to begin graduate school for her MBA (Master of Business Administration) at New Mexico State in Las Cruces, where she also worked as a waitress at the El Sombrero Patio Café.

The Sepich’s lived in Carlsbad, two-hundred miles east of Las Cruces. They owned a janitorial supply operation and commercial cleaning company.

The Sepich Family:

Left To Right: Dave, Katie, A.J., Jayann, And Caraline

After patronizing a bar on the evening of August 30, 2003, Katie and her boyfriend, Joe Bischoff, attended a party at the home of a fellow student. Upwards of twenty to thirty other NMSU students were in and out of the house that evening and into the following morning. Several attendees saw Katie and Joe arguing after she found him kissing another girl, his roommate’s sister.

Tracee Waters, Katie’s roommate, had gone to bed in a room at the home of the party; she was unaware of the argument between Katie and Joe. Without telling Tracee or Joe, an angry and somewhat inebriated Katie is believed to have left the party without taking her purse, cell phone, and car keys shortly before 3:00 a.m. on August 31.

Katie With Her Boyfriend, Joe Bischoff

When the partiers awoke later that morning, Katie’s car was still parked near the home, but there was no sign of Katie. The vehicle was intact and everything inside it was also in order.

The finding, along with Katie’s leaving her keys behind, suggested she had walked the several blocks home from the party.

Katie’s Car Is Found . . .

When Tracee arrived home that morning, however, Katie was not there. Tracee’s mother had slept at her home the previous night and had not been awakened. She is certain she would have heard Katie if she had come home.

. . . But No Katie

Tracee reported Katie as missing that afternoon, several hours after her friend’s body had been found by the hunter. The victim was the soon confirmed as Katie. An autopsy determined she had been raped, strangled to death, and set on fire before being deposited at the dump site. The fire burned out before burning her body.

As no signs of a struggle were found in the desert area where she was found, Katie was determined to have been killed elsewhere.  The likely locale was soon located.

The Murder Woman Is Confirmed As Katie

It appeared Katie had made it to her home after leaving the party as police found a shattered window in the back of the house. A struggle appeared to have occurred as her sandal shoes were found lying beneath it.  The watch and two rings she had worn to the party had been taken by her killer.

Katie had fought for her life as bloodied DNA was found beneath her fingernails.

Clues Found On Katie

Joe initially told police he and Katie had not argued at the party. He admitted they had done so after being told several attendees had seen them in a heated exchange; Joe said they were both drunk.

After awakening later that morning and realizing Katie was gone, Joe went on to say he drove her car by her home looking for her, but he did not explain why he had not knocked on the door to inquire about her. Casting further suspicion on himself, Joe made several phone calls to Katie’s cell phone, saying he was hoping to reach her. Several people at the party, however, said he had taken the phone along with her purse and keys after finding she was not at the home.

Suspicion was mounting on Joe. In addition to having done only a “drive-by” of Katie’s home, it appeared he was also trying to develop a “cover story.”  He became the prime suspect in his girlfriend’s murder after he was the only party attendee who refused to provide a DNA sample.

Joe’s parents hired an attorney who told him to stop talking to the police.

Joe Is Suspected Of Murdering His Girlfriend . . . 

Katie and Joe had had sex the day before the party, and male DNA, presumably Joe’s, was found on her bedsheets. To authorities’ surprise, it did not match the DNA found in Katie’s pubic area or that on her fingernails.

Following the finding, Joe agreed to give a DNA sample. He said he had not done so earlier because he was afraid he would be charged with Katie’s murder after his DNA was found on her.

. . . But He Is Ultimately Cleared

With Joe Bischoff eliminated as the culprit and after finding no other person with an apparent grudge against Katie, investigators began to suspect she had been randomly killed, the toughest kind of murder to solve. A check through nationwide DNA databases produced no hits of the DNA found on Katie.

Katie’s Case Goes Cold

Soon, however, investigators believed they caught a break.

On August 20, eleven days before Katie’s murder, a twenty-five-year-old woman was attacked by two men after leaving a bar following an argument with her boyfriend in Green Bay, Wisconsin, over 1,500 miles from Las Cruces, New Mexico. The men forced her into their truck and drove her to a secluded farm area near Rockland, one-hundred-eighty miles west of Green Bay, where they raped her, poured a liquid on her, and lit her on fire before fleeing.

The crime was eerily similar to the murder of Katie Sepich with one major exception; the Wisconsin woman survived and made her way to a home for help. She recalled enough details of her attackers to help police develop composite sketches.

Composites of the Green Bay Attackers

The manager of the Brown County Gold Dust Dairy Farm recognized the renderings as two of his employees. Twenty-seven-year-old Gregorio Morales and twenty-three-year-old Juan Nieto had hastily and separately left town after the attack. Morales, however, had recently returned and was back working at the farm. It was learned her had lived within two-hundred miles of Las Cruces, New Mexico, at the time of Katie Sepich’s murder.

The dairy farm manager gave Morales a soda and retrieved the bottle which he gave to police. In 2004, several months after the bottle was submitted for DNA testing, it was matched to that found on the Green Bay victim.

Morales was convicted of two counts of sexual assault, kidnapping, and first degree reckless injury. He was sentenced to fifty years in prison and forty years of extended supervision.

Gregorio Morales

In 2005, Juan Nieto was tracked to DeKalb County Georgia, where he was arrested. The woman believed he was the one who poured the liquid on her in the attempt to burn her.

Nieto accepted a plea deal in which he was sentenced to seventy years in prison. He argued his lawyers had not adequately explained the terms to him, but his request that it be withdrawn was rejected.

Juan Nieto

The attack and leaving for dead of the Green Bay woman was nearly identical to the rape and murder of Katie Sepich in Las Cruces. Neither Morales’ nor Nieto’s DNA, however, was matched to Katie’s killer.

The Wisconsin Rapists Are Not Katie’s Killer

In November 2003, nine weeks after the murder of Katie Sepich, a man armed with a knife broke into the apartment of two other New Mexico State students. The women took cover in their bathroom and phoned 911. Police responded and arrested the intruder, twenty-four-year-old Mexican national Gabriel Avila, before he could inflict any harm on the students.

Avila was released on bond to get his affairs in order and disappeared. He fled to Mexico but was captured in 2005 after attempting to re-enter the United States. A year later, he was sentenced to nine years in prison after being convicted of aggravated burglary and intent to commit aggravated assault.

As a convicted felon, Avila was required to submit a DNA sample.

Gabriel Avila . . . 

In December 2006, Avila’s DNA was matched to that of the skin and blood found beneath Katie Sepich’s fingernails. Investigators located a truck he had sold shortly after her murder and the tire tracks were matched to those found near Katie’s home on the morning she was murdered.

Avila’s former wife, who had divorced him after his conviction of the burglary charges, had kept a ring she had found wedged in the seat of the truck; it was confirmed to have been worn by Katie at the party.

. . . Is Katie’s Killer

Avila admitted to Katie Sepich’s murder and confirmed investigators’ suspicions that it was a crime of opportunity.

While attempting to purchase cocaine in the neighborhood near where the party was held, Avila said he saw a drunk Katie walking along the road and offered her a ride. She declined and Avila claimed he went on his way, only to soon chance upon her again at her home. He then “snapped” and attacked her after he observed her trying to enter her apartment through a window.

Avila Confesses

Katie had left her keys at her friend’s home, and, likely because she was tired and inebriated, had apparently attempted to gain entrance to her apartment through the window.

Katie’s Killing Was A Crime Of Opportunity

For the murder of Katie Sepich, Gabriel Avila was given sixty-nine years in prison without the possibility of parole in May 2007. He is serving his sentence at the Lea County Correctional Facility in Hobbs, New Mexico.

Avila Sentenced

Collected DNA samples of convicted criminals are recorded in the national DNA database CODIS, (Combined DNA Index System), which contains over five million records.

CODIS matched Gabriel Avila’s DNA to that found on Katie Sepich’s body, but he was not linked to her murder for more than three years because his DNA was not entered into the system until 2006, after he had been convicted of the burglary and assault. Had the DNA been entered after his 2003 arrest for breaking and entering, he would have been charged with Katie’s murder three years sooner and his attempted assault on the other New Mexico State student would not have occurred.  In addition to the suffering endured by Katie’s family, more than $200,000 was spent on the investigation into her murder during those three years.

The DNA Match Could Have Been Made Sooner

Dave and Jayann Sepich became advocates for legislation expanding the use of DNA in unsolved murders and expediting the testing process. In 2008, Jayann established the nonprofit organization “DNA Saves” to educate both lawmakers and the public about the benefits of DNA testing.

Seven years after Katie’s murder, the Katie Sepich Enhanced DNA Collection Act of 2010, more commonly called “Katie’s Law,” was proposed. Whereas most states require a DNA sample from a person following the conviction of a major crime, enactment of Katie’s Law would require a DNA sample to be obtained following only the arrest of anyone charged with the crimes of murder, manslaughter, sexual assault, kidnapping, and aggravated burglary.

Katie And Her Parents, Dave and Jayann Sepich

Dona Ana County District Attorney Susana Martinez prosecuted Gabriel Avila. In April 2011, three months after becoming Governor of New Mexico, she signed into law an expansion of Katie’s Law, requiring a DNA sample for anyone charged with any kind of felony.

Susana Martinez

Former Prosecutor And New Mexico Governor

Jayann Sepich continues to push to get Katie’s Law implemented nationwide. She is over halfway home as thirty-one states have passed versions of the law named for her daughter.

On the federal level, however, Katie’s Law has been stalled for over a decade. The bill was passed in the House of Representatives in 2010 and soon introduced in the Senate, but the latter chamber has taken no action on the bill. In 2013, however, President Obama signed a law helping to fund expanded DNA testing.

Jayann’s Crusade

Opponents of Katie’s Law argue the legislation is an invasion of privacy and/or a violation of civil rights, and that because DNA contains sensitive genetic information, it is not the “fingerprints of the 21st century.”

Proponents of Katie’s Law counter that DNA profiling is not the same as genome sequencing. Only an individual’s DNA, not his or her name, goes into a profile containing no genetic information and which can be used only for criminal identification. Another point of emphasis is that Katie’s Law has not only helped convict people of violent crimes but has also exonerated others.

In United States v. Pool, a federal district court upheld the federal statute allowing collection of DNA samples prior to conviction for inclusion in the national DNA database. The court held such collecting does not represent a violation of constitutional rights, specifically stating it does not violate Fourth Amendment protections against unreasonable searches and seizures.

The court also dismissed claims of violations of the Fifth Amendment’s due process clause and of the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition of cruel and unusual punishment.

The DNA Debate

In the 2013 decision of Maryland v. King, the Supreme Court ruled, 5-4, that DNA collection at the time of arrest for major crimes was constitutional. The decision produced an odd assortment of judicial bedfellows.

Traditionally liberal justice Stephen Breyer sided with conservative Justices Samuel Alito, Clarence Thomas and Chief Justice John Roberts for the majority, while Antonin Scalia, a staunch conservative, joined liberals Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Elena Kagan, and Sonia Sotomayor in dissenting.

In writing the majority decision, Justice Anthony Kennedy, who was generally the court’s “swing vote,” wrote “. . . taking and analyzing a cheek swab of the arrestee’s DNA is, like fingerprinting and photographing, a legitimate police booking procedure that is reasonable under the Fourth Amendment.”

Odd Alliances On The High Court

Two murdered victims. Same first name. Same initials. One letter, however, distinguishes them. “Katie’s Law” is not to be confused with “Kate’s Law.”

“Katie’s Law,” named for Katie Sepich, has to do with DNA testing. “Kate’s Law,” named for Kate Steinle, has to do with proposed enhanced penalties for illegal aliens who commit violent crimes in the United States.

                                Katie Sepich                     Kate Steinle

                               “Katie’s Law”                    “Kate’s Law” 

In 2015, Mexican illegal immigrant Jose García Zárate shot Kate Stienle do death while she was walking with her father and a friend along Pier 14 in the Embarcadero district of San Francisco.

Garcia Zárate, who had been deported from America five times, was acquitted of murder and manslaughter charges in 2017 as the shooting was ruled accidental. He admitted to firing the gun that killed Kate Steinle, but said he found it under a bench wrapped in a T-shirt and that he accidentally fired it upon picking it up. Officials say the bullet ricocheted off the ground and struck and killed her. The handgun belonged to a United States Bureau of Land Management Ranger who reported it stolen from his parked car a week earlier.

Convicted of seven felonies, García Zárate was convicted in federal court of unlawful possession of a firearm, but it was overturned on appeal in 2019 after the state trial court was found not to have instructed the jury on the state’s affirmative defense of momentary possession.

In 2022, Garcia Zarate was convicted on federal charges of illegal re-entry to the United States after deportation. In June 2024, he was again deported to Mexico.

Jose Garcia Zarate

Luck played a role in finding Katie Sepich’s body. If the hunter who found her had not chosen that particular section in the desert for target shooting, her body may not have been found for weeks, months, or perhaps even years. An unexplained abnormality Katie had, however, also may have cost her life.

Avila had abducted Katie from right outside her home as she was attempting to enter. Her roommate, Tracee’s mother, was asleep in the home only a few feet from where the attack occurred. Katie ferociously fought her attacker but Tracee’s mother did not hear anything because Katie, for unknown reasons, was unable to scream. Her parents said ever since she was little, when she attempted to scream, she produced nothing but blank air.

https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/14049030/kathryn_jaye-sepich

Katie Could Not Scream

SOURCES:

• Carlsbad Current Argus
• Dateline NBC
• Dona Ana County, New Mexico Website
• ABC Affiliate KVIA Channel 7, El Paso, Texas
• Las Cruces Sun-News
• Lincoln Journal-Star
• The Surviving Parents Coalition