San Jose cold case solved after man pleads guilty to raping 61-year-old woman in 2008: prosecutors
SAN JOSE, Calif. -- More than 18 years after a masked man broke into a 61-year-old woman's San Jose apartment and raped her, an Indiana man has pleaded guilty to the crime, prosecutors said.
James Whisenand's case was solved through DNA evidence and the work of the Santa Clara County District Attorney's Office Cold Case Unit, San Jose police and authorities in Indiana, prosecutors said in a statement Tuesday.
The victim, who was 61 at the time of the attack, died of natural causes in 2011.
"Years and distance do not matter," District Attorney Jeff Rosen said in a statement released. "I just wish I could have told her that we got him. I wish she was here with us today."
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Whisenand entered the woman's first-floor apartment on Saint Elizabeth Drive on Jan. 6, 2008, wearing a ski mask, prosecutors said. He punched her in the face, breaking her nose, then choked her before sexually assaulting her multiple times. Investigators did not identify a suspect at the time.
In March 2024, the District Attorney's crime lab was notified that DNA collected at the scene and entered into the national Combined DNA Index System, known as CODIS, matched Whisenand. He had been convicted of misdemeanor sexual battery in 2023 and was registered as a sex offender.
The DNA match was confirmed in August 2024.
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Whisenand was arrested in September 2024 with help from Indiana State Police, the U.S. Marshals Service, the Clay County Sheriff's Office and police in Brazil, Indiana.
"Authorities convinced him to come down to the local police department to fill out forms related to his sex registration. He was met by San Jose Police Department Special Victims Unit Sgt. Sean Pierce and Det. John Moutzouridis, the original detectives who investigated the assault in 2008," the District Attorney's Office said.
Court records show Whisenand lived with his then-wife on Meridian Avenue in San Jose when the attack happened, just two blocks from the woman's senior living facility.
Under the plea agreement, Whisenand is expected to receive a 25-year prison term. His sentencing hearing is scheduled for 9 a.m. Thursday at the Hall of Justice in San Jose.
