A group of criminology students from the University of Texas Arlington has played a pivotal role in cracking a murder case that had remained unsolved for over 30 years, leading to an arrest in connection with the crime.

On Monday, U.S. Marshals apprehended Janie Perkins, 63, linking her to the 1991 murder of 25-year-old Cynthia Gonzalez. The breakthrough came after the students identified Perkins as a key suspect in their investigative study.

Cynthia Gonzalez, a mother and performer in the adult entertainment industry, vanished on September 16, 1991, after leaving her home to meet a client. Concerned, her ex-husband reported her missing the following day.

As the investigation unfolded, authorities discovered Gonzalez’s vehicle abandoned, raising suspicions of a potential kidnapping. However, the search took a grim turn on September 22 when her body was discovered with multiple gunshot wounds on private land in rural Johnson County.

Despite various leads over the years, law enforcement had been unable to arrest anyone until the student’s involvement. This development stemmed from a new collaboration between the university and the local police department, allowing fresh eyes to revisit the cold case.

Over the years, police received several leads, but were not able to make any arrests until the students started reviewing the case in the fall as part of a new partnership between the University of Texas Arlington and the police department.

Students in the criminology program were selected for the new course based on their previous coursework and essay expressing their interest in helping law enforcement, the Fort Worth Star-Telegram reports. 

The students were then given flash drives containing ‘massive amounts of paperwork’ with all of the case files and related evidence – except for physical items -to three cold cases in Arlington, said Patricia Eddings a senior lecturer at the school’s Department of Criminology and Criminal Justice.

Janie Perkins, 63, was arrested on November 6 in connection with a 34-year-old cold case

Students at University of Texas Arlington reviewed the case files and helped solve the murder

It was seen as helpful for the local police department because it does not have a full-time cold case unit, and detectives can only work on unsolved murders between active, current investigations.

‘When we launched our cold case partnership with UTA, we always hoped we’d get an outcome like this one day,’ Police Chief Al Jones said in a statement.

‘I don’t think any of us expected that lightning would strike the first time,’ he added before thanking the students ‘for their work and dedication to this case.’

Those students reviewed up to 500 files related to Gonzalez’s case, when Perkins started to stand out as a suspect, NBC News reports.

They realized that officers back in the 1990s learned that Perkins and Gonzalez were good friends and shared a romantic partner.

But just weeks before Gonzalez was murdered, the unidentified partner told Perkins he was ending his relationship with her to be with Gonzalez.

When she was then questioned about her friend’s murder, Perkins had no alibi for the night Gonzalez went missing and failed two voluntary polygraph tests when she was asked if she knew who was responsible for Gonzalez’s death and disappearance.

She even told cops she was glad Gonzalez was dead and had thought about killing her or having someone else do it. 

Cynthia Gonzalez, 25, a mother-of-one who was working as an ‘adult entertainer,’ was last seen leaving her home on September 16, 1991 to meet a ‘client’ before she was reported missing

However, Perkins was never charged in the case as polygraph tests are not admissible in court and there was no actual evidence tying her to the case. 

Cops have since reviewed the case, including once just last year, but investigators ‘did not believe there was any new evidence or leads to pursue’ and instead agreed to ‘keep the case open.’

But when the students started asking questions about Perkins, detectives returned to the investigation files and discovered that witnesses had said she admitted she was involved in her friend’s murder and mentioned specific details that were not publicly available.

‘Detectives compared those witness statements to the evidence in the case and found they aligned,’ police said. ‘They believe this demonstrated Ms. Perkins either participated in or facilitated Ms. Gonzalez’s kidnapping and murder.’

Perkins was then arrested by US Marshals in Axle, Texas on November 6 and was charged with one count of capital murder.

She was then booked in Tarrant County Jail, but was released on a $150,000 bond.

Still, Perkins’ arrest marked an end to the mystery that has haunted Jessica Roberts, who was only six years old when her mother was murdered, for the past 34 years.

Her daughter Jessica Roberts expressed thanks to the college students for their work

‘I am so thankful for this program and I’m so proud of these students at UTA, and I’m so thankful for what they have done in the time they’ve spent and the effort they’ve put into this case,’ she said at a news conference.

She added that she was left feeling ‘overwhelmed, shock, excitement, just a mixture of everything’ by the news of the arrest, according to the Arlington Report.  

Roberts added that she had heard of Perkins but did not know her personally.

‘What shocked me the most is, first of all, that it had been solved and an arrest had been made,’ she said.

‘But who the person was, who was responsible for this – she was apparently a good friend of our mom’s and I was shocked that somebody so close could do something like this.’ 

‘The grief never subsided,’ Roberts said. ‘It came in waves year after year and not even just for me, but for other family members as well and friends of my mom.’ 

Alyssa Ramirez, a senior criminal justice major at the University of Texas Arlington who is graduating in December and plans to go into law enforcement and become a detective, said she was also glad she could help get Roberts some closure.

‘I’m very happy that she’s not only getting answers but getting closer to closure as well,’ she said. ‘And I think that’s exactly why I chose this field – to be able to do that for people who haven’t been able to.

‘When I saw her talking up there, it was really emotional,’ she added. ‘I’m so thankful we were able to do this for her.’