DNA from Discarded Straw Identifies Suspect in Long Island Cold Case Murder

A discarded smoothie straw sitting in an evidence pipeline finally gave Theresa Fusco’s case a name. Nearly four decades after the Lynbrook teenager vanished, investigators say DNA from that straw matched biological evidence recovered from Fusco’s body and identified Richard Bilodeau as the prime suspect.

Fusco was 16 when she disappeared on November 10, 1984, after leaving her part-time job at Hot Skates in Lynbrook. Her body was found weeks later, on December 5, 1984, buried under leaves in a wooded area near the rink. Authorities said she had been raped and strangled to death, turning a local missing-teen nightmare into one of Long Island’s most notorious cold-case murders.

The case took another cruel turn in the 1980s. Three men were arrested and prosecuted for Fusco’s killing in 1986, and all three were later exonerated after DNA testing in 2003 showed the biological evidence from Fusco’s body did not match them. Two of those men later received $18 million each in wrongful-conviction awards. The Fusco case became a lasting symbol of how bad forensic work and tunnel vision can wreck lives, even as the real killer remained unidentified.

That changed in early 2024, when investigators began focusing on Bilodeau. Prosecutors say the break came in February 2024, when detectives recovered a discarded cup and straw Bilodeau had used at Tropical Smoothie Cafe. Advanced genetic genealogy and DNA testing linked that material to evidence from Fusco’s body, giving investigators the first credible suspect in the case. At the time of the killing, Bilodeau was 23 and living with his grandparents in Lynbrook. At the time of his arrest, he lived in Center Moriches and worked nights at Walmart.

Bilodeau was charged with second-degree murder and pleaded not guilty. If convicted, he faces 25 years to life in prison. Nassau County District Attorney Anne Donnelly said investigators had been watching him since early 2024, and Fusco’s father, Thomas Fusco, said the arrest brought a painful but long-awaited sense of finalization.

The case has also been tied to the broader Long Island backdrop that locals and investigators have long called the Lynbrook Triangle, a cluster of teen disappearances and unresolved violence that has haunted the area for years. With the arrest now in hand, Theresa Fusco’s case has moved from the pile of grim local legends back into the hard machinery of prosecution, where a straw, a DNA match, and a buried body finally gave the old file an answer.