The apparent breakthrough came five years ago when an inmate said he saw the suspect and another man with the victim's body.
Jason Tibbs and Rayna Rison (Pic: Indiana State
Police
A US man has been formally charged with the murder of his teenage
ex-girlfriend who was strangled in Indiana 20 years ago.
The charges come five years after prosecutors say they got a breakthrough in
the case that eventually led them to him.
A judge entered a not guilty plea on behalf of 38-year-old suspect Jason Tibbs over the killing of 16-year-old Rayna Rison and ordered he be held in custody.
Ms Rison went missing on March 26, 1993 and the same day her car was found in a rural area several miles north of her hometown of LaPorte.
A week later, her boyfriend's high school jacket, which she had been wearing, was found hanging from a tree.
About a month after she vanished, fishermen found Ms Rison's body in a pond a few miles from where her car was discovered.
The apparent breakthrough in the case came in 2008.
Prosecutors have revealed Rickey Hammons, an inmate at the Wabash Valley Correction Facility, came forward that year to say he saw his sister's boyfriend at the time, Eric Freeman, and Tibbs with Ms Rison's body right after she went missing.
Freeman, who was 14 at the time, said he was smoking pot in the loft of a barn when Tibbs and Freeman pulled up, driving his sister's Buick Century.
He said they opened the boot, revealing Ms Rison's body inside, and they argued, with Freeman asking Tibbs why he killed the girl.
According to prosecutors, police interviewed Freeman in 2008 and he denied Hammons' account and refused to talk to them again.
But they say that after being promised immunity from prosecution two months ago, Freeman told police he saw Tibbs kill Rison.
He said Tibbs was trying to get back together with her, and they got into an argument that escalated to blows and eventually to Tibbs strangling her.
Freeman said he and Tibbs then drove to the barn with the body and later disposed of it in the pond.
Prosecutors initially charged Ms Rison's brother-in-law, Ray McCarty, with killing her but the charge was dropped due to lack of evidence.
A judge entered a not guilty plea on behalf of 38-year-old suspect Jason Tibbs over the killing of 16-year-old Rayna Rison and ordered he be held in custody.
Ms Rison went missing on March 26, 1993 and the same day her car was found in a rural area several miles north of her hometown of LaPorte.
A week later, her boyfriend's high school jacket, which she had been wearing, was found hanging from a tree.
About a month after she vanished, fishermen found Ms Rison's body in a pond a few miles from where her car was discovered.
The apparent breakthrough in the case came in 2008.
Prosecutors have revealed Rickey Hammons, an inmate at the Wabash Valley Correction Facility, came forward that year to say he saw his sister's boyfriend at the time, Eric Freeman, and Tibbs with Ms Rison's body right after she went missing.
Freeman, who was 14 at the time, said he was smoking pot in the loft of a barn when Tibbs and Freeman pulled up, driving his sister's Buick Century.
He said they opened the boot, revealing Ms Rison's body inside, and they argued, with Freeman asking Tibbs why he killed the girl.
According to prosecutors, police interviewed Freeman in 2008 and he denied Hammons' account and refused to talk to them again.
But they say that after being promised immunity from prosecution two months ago, Freeman told police he saw Tibbs kill Rison.
He said Tibbs was trying to get back together with her, and they got into an argument that escalated to blows and eventually to Tibbs strangling her.
Freeman said he and Tibbs then drove to the barn with the body and later disposed of it in the pond.
Prosecutors initially charged Ms Rison's brother-in-law, Ray McCarty, with killing her but the charge was dropped due to lack of evidence.
