Jail Cell (credit: Jeff Haynes/AFP/Getty Images)
MINEOLA, N.Y. (AP) – A man linked through DNA evidence to the 1989 murder of a New Jersey woman on Long Island has been convicted.
Joey Bethea was found guilty of murder in the strangulation of 22-year-old Dorothy LeConte, of North Bergen, N.J. She was visiting relatives on Long Island. Her body was found near Hempstead High School.
Bethea, who lived in upstate Bainbridge, N.Y., faces 25 years to life in prison at sentencing.
His attorney told Newsday that Bethea maintains his innocence.
Bethea was arrested in 2009 and charged with stealing from a Bainbridge gas station.
A swab of DNA linked him to the unsolved murder.
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