Man, 52, charged over sexual assault and strangulation of seven-year-old North Carolina girl in 1990
- Donald Preston Ferguson arrested on Tuesday over 1990 killing of Shalonda Poole
- The South Carolina man has been charged with first-degree murder and sexual assault
- Shalonda's body was found behind a North Carolina elementary school near where Ferguson occasionally worked
- He’s being held in the Spartanburg County jail to be extradited to Greensboro
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Arrested: Donald Preston Ferguson, 52, has been charged over the sexual assault and murder of a seven-year-old girl in 1990
A 52-year-old man has been charged over the sexual assault and strangulation of a little girl whose battered body was found dumped behind a North Carolina elementary school more than 20 years ago.
Donald Preston Ferguson was arrested at his Spartanburg, South Carolina home yesterday and charged with first-degree murder and sexual assault.
Police said advances in forensic technology enabled them to link Ferguson to the horrific 23-year-old cold case which rocked Greensboro, Fox 8 Carolina reported.
In July 1990, the body of seven-year-old Shalonda Poole was found in the woods behind Jones Elementary School, a day after she went missing. Shalonda's tiny body showed signs of strangulation and rape.
Shalonda's family said they had never given up hope the little girl's killer would be found.
'They said it's official. We got her killer,' Shalonda's mother Marilyn Poole said, according to Fox 8 Carolina.
'I had dreamed that this day was going to come. I have walked these floors crying out loud...He took my heart and cut it up.'
Poole said her family had known Ferguson, who worked occasionally near Shalonda's school, about a month before the girl's death.
Ferguson had sat at the kitchen table in the girl’s home and played cards with Shalonda's parents just days before her death, according to News & Record.
Shalonda's father Gattis Poole is still furious: 'I just want to get my hands on him.'
Heartbreaking: The battered body of Shalonda Poole, seven, was found near a North Carolina elementary school in July 1990
Greensboro Police Department spokesman, Captain Mike Richey, told News & Record officers never stopped looking for Shalonda's killer.
He said numerous detectives have questioned hundreds of people over the grisly murder.
'This case has galvanized the attention of officers and the public alike,' he said. 'Some of our most grizzled veterans were on the scene and to this day, it still affects them.'
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ShareDays after Shalonda's body was found, police arrested Melvin Bennett, a cafeteria worker.
The mentally disabled man was found not-guilty two years later.
Scene: Shalonda's body was found in a wooded area near Jones Elementary School, North Carolina (pictured) in 1990
Hopeful: Shalonda's mother, Marilyn Poole, said she had never given up hope her daughter's killer would be found
In 2007, Detective A.R. Hinson began reviewing the case file and, using information obtained from an interview, was led to Ferguson.
Police said Ferguson was 29 when Shalonda was reported missing from her family’s Hampton Homes residence.
He left the Greensboro area a month after Shalonda was killed.
In October 1990, he was charged with and convicted of a sexual assault in Spartanburg and was released in 1997.
Ferguson was on probation when he was arrested yesterday.
He is in the Spartanburg County jail pending extradition to Greensboro.
A Spartanburg County judge denied Ferguson bond early this morning.
Police said advances in forensics technology resulted in the arrest, with officers keying in on a person interviewed early in the investigation.
Without elaborating on the process, officers were able to develop enough probable cause in the past few weeks to make an arrest.
Marilyn Poole said the arrest would provide some closure for her family. Shalonda would have been 31-years-old today.
She remembers explaining to Shalonda's twin sister at the time that the little girl was not coming home.
'She used to ask me all the time, ‘Where is my sister?’ ' Poole said. 'I couldn’t explain it to her - why God came to get her sister.'
Ripped apart: Shalonda Poole pictured with her twin sister
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