Is April Tinsley's Accused Killer Linked to 2017 Murder of Indiana Hikers?

The person responsible for the deaths of Liberty German and Abby Williams last year has yet to be caught.

Law enforcement officials are examining whether the man recently arrested in a 30-year-old cold case is connected to a more recent double murder.

John Miller, 59, of Fort Wayne, Indiana, was arrested this week in the 1988 strangulation of 8-year-old April Tinsley. April’s body was discovered by a jogger three days after her disappearance in a water-filled ditch in a rural field. The blond-haired little girl had been sexually assaulted and asphyxiated, officials said.

The case was cold for years, but two suspects were finally identified after the Fort Wayne Police Department submitted DNA found on Tinsley to Parabon NanoLabs for testing. Miller then emerged as a suspect. He was apprehended Sunday outside his Fort Wayne home. 

But it's the possible connection to another case that is now attracting attention. Miller lived just two hours from the city of Delphi, where teens Libby German, 14, and Abigail Williams, 13, were killed in February 2017. They disappeared while hiking last year, only to be found dead by a search party on Valentine's Day.

The only clues? A grainy photo taken of the suspect approaching the girls on a rickety bridge, as well as a recording on one of the girls’ cellphones, saying, "Down the hill."

The eerie audio helped fuel national interest in the case. But a year and a half later, a suspect has yet to be apprehended. 

Since Miller's arrest, however, there's been speculation that he resembles the man in a sketch of the suspected killer in the Delphi case, which was released by police last year. 

For now, police won't say whether the cases are connected. 

"We are in the process of talking with the Fort Wayne Police Department, so we are getting information and we're checking things out," Indian State Police Sgt. Kim Riley told Inside Edition. 

A plea of not guilty has been entered on Miller's behalf for charges of murder and child molestation in relation to April's case.

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