'We Have a Sense of Why He Did It': Arrest in 1992 Murder

Authorities say a man has been charged with killing a Massachusetts middle school teacher's aide 25 years ago, the AP reports. Hampden District Attorney Anthony Gulluni said Monday that Gary Schara, of West Springfield, Massachusetts, was arrested in Connecticut and charged with the April 1992 death of Lisa Ziegert. Gulluni says a person close to Schara recently provided police with handwritten documents in which the man admitted raping and killing Ziegert. The district attorney says authorities later obtained a DNA sample that matched evidence found on her body.

Ziegert was working her night job at a gift shop when she disappeared. Her body was found four days later in a wooded area nearby; she had been raped and stabbed, CBS News reports. She had told her sister and others she felt she was being watched in the days leading up to her disappearance. Authorities say Schara first popped up on their radar in 1993 in relation to the case, though they wouldn't say why. "We have a sense of why he did it, yes," Gulluni told reporters. Ziegert's mother says her family is grateful to finally obtain justice. (More cold cases stories.)