A dying Alabama man called police Wednesday to confess to a murder from 1995, ending the near 26-year old cold case.
Johnny Dwight Whited called the Decatur Police Department Wednesday to confess to the April 26, 1995 murder of Christopher Alvin Dailey, according to a Facebook post from the police.
COLD CASE MURDER ARREST: On April 26, 1995, the Decatur Police Department responded to George Russell Road SW, in…
Posted by Decatur Police Department Alabama on Thursday, November 19, 2020
“I want to confess to a murder that I did years ago,” Detective Sean Mukaddam, a violent crimes investigator in Decatur who specializes in cold cases, said Whited told him, according to The New York Times (NYT).
Decatur Police said Dailey died “from a single gunshot wound” and his death was ruled a homicide. However, despite a deep investigation, investigators said they could not solve the case, even after they revisited it multiple times.
It wasn’t until Whited turned himself in that the case was solved.
“I’ve never had a situation where I just pick up the phone and have a call like that,” Mukaddam said. “Nothing where the suspect calls me out of the blue and wants to confess.”
“He was remorseful,” Mukaddam said, according to the NYT, noting Whited said he was “terminally ill.” (RELATED: REPORT: Police Say Remains Found In Murder Investigation Point To Cannibalism)
“He was embarrassed about certain things. He wanted to get it off his chest,” Mukaddam continued, as reported by the NYT.
However, Whited reportedly was unsure of the exact date or year of the killing, forcing detectives to piece together all the information and review every homicide since the 1980’s, the NYT reported.
Whited, 53, took detectives to the location Wednesday where Dailey’s body was found and re-enacted the killing, according to the NYT.
Whited was arrested and charged with murder. He is being held on a $15,000 bond, according to police.