California authorities have identified Lydia Jane Wade McWhorter as the last previously unidentified victim linked to serial killer Keith Jesperson, nearly 34 years after her body was found beside a highway near Blythe. The identification closes Riverside County’s final unidentified-victim case connected to murders for which Jesperson was convicted, and gives McWhorter’s family an answer after decades of uncertainty.

McWhorter’s body was found on 30 August 1992 along Highway 95; Jesperson, who knew her as “Claudia”, later admitted killing her. Investigators renewed their appeal in 2024, used genetic genealogy to identify paternal relatives, and confirmed her identity this week through DNA from a maternal relative. Jesperson was arrested in 1995, confessed to killing eight women across several US states, and received 25 years to life for McWhorter’s murder in 2010 while already serving multiple life sentences in Oregon.