Rolla, MO: Man to be tried this month for murder in 27-year-old case

By Associated Press
11:17 AM CDT, October 12, 2009
ROLLA, Mo. (AP) — A 67-year-old man from Beaufort will be tried later this month in a 27-year-old murder case.

Donald Nash is accused of killing his former girlfriend, Judy Spencer. The 21-year-old had been living in Salem when her partially clothed body was discovered in rural Dent County in March 1982. She'd been strangled and shot.

The Rolla Daily News reports Nash will be tried Oct. 26 in Phelps County on a change of venue.

Nash told investigators at the time that he and Spencer fought the night she disappeared and that he had searched for her.

A break in the case came in March 2008 when a DNA sample from Nash returned a positive match to Spencer's nail clipping collected after her murder. He was arrested two weeks later.