Overview
- Officials identified Steven Briecke, who died in 2014, as responsible for the 1996 rape of an 82-year-old and the 1997 killing of 69-year-old Ann Lustig in Suffolk County.
- Advanced DNA testing connected both cases to the same person, with similar black and green fibers consistent with vehicle mats and carpets supporting the link.
- Both victims were elderly patients reported missing from the defunct Kings Park State Psychiatric Hospital, and a medical examiner found Lustig died from blunt force trauma and neck compression.
- Briecke’s DNA was in databases due to a 1985 burglary and assault conviction and a 2003 sexual-assault conviction in Florida, enabling investigators to make the match.
- The Suffolk County Cold Case Task Force, assigned in April 2024, led the reexamination that solved the cases, though no prosecution is possible because the suspect is deceased.