Trial date set for 42-year-old cold case

Extradited in January of 2015 from the prison where he was serving time for kidnapping and attempting to kill a woman there, Halbower’s trial has been delayed for years so a jury could weigh in on his competency to stand trial and so his request to represent himself could be reviewed. In June 2016, a jury found Halbower competent to stand trial and a judge denied his motion to represent himself, according to prosecutors. 

Halbower is facing 15 years to life in prison for murder charges after his DNA was linked to the deaths of Paula Baxter, 17, and Veronica Anne Cascio, 18. He’s believed to have raped the teens before stabbing them in 1976.

Cascio was the first victim to disappear and her body was discovered at the Sharp Park Golf Course in Pacifica. Baxter’s body was found behind a church in Millbrae about a month later in February. Halbower was once a suspect for three other murders that occurred in similar fashions in northern San Mateo County in early 1976, including the murder of Peninsula woman Denise Lampe, who was found dead in her car at the Serramonte Shopping Center, as well as the murder of a young woman named Michelle Mitchell that same year in Reno, Nevada. 

The body of Tanya Blackwell, 14, was discovered months after her January disappearance in 1976 off Gypsy Hill Road in Pacifica. Carol Lee Booth, 26, was last seen in South San Francisco March 15 before her body was discovered in early May. Lampe was the fifth Peninsula victim and was killed in April that same year in Daly City.

Investigators broadened their search for Lampe’s killer when they discovered Halbower was in custody at a Nevada jail facing rape and other related charges when the young woman was last seen leaving Serramonte Shopping Center in Daly City April 1, 1976, according to prosecutors. 

In November, prosecutors announced a murder charge against 71-year-old convict and known sexual predator Leon Melvin Seymour after tying him to Lampe’s case based on DNA found from a bloodstain on her jacket, Wagstaffe said.

Civilly committed to Coalinga State Hospital after serving a 33-year prison sentence, Seymour has been convicted for sexually assaulting six different female victims. His charges included rape and attempted sodomy in San Mateo County and other counties. Seymour is expected to appear in court June 13 for preliminary hearing, according to prosecutors. 

After Halbower’s trial for the murders of Baxter and Cascio, he will be transported to Nevada to face charges in the kidnapping, stabbing and murder of Mitchell. 

anna@smdailyjournal.com

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