Decades after he was slain, victim identified as ex-Marine

BELTSVILLE, Md. – More than three decades after a man was found slain in the Washington suburbs, authorities have identified him as an ex-Marine.

Prince George’s County Police said Wednesday he was 27-year-old Bennett Louis. His mostly skeletal remains were found in 1984 in woods in Beltsville.

Detective Bernard Nelson says the body couldn’t be identified then, but the FBI’s new fingerprint technology made a match recently. Now investigators working on Louis’ slaying want to figure out why he was in the area.

Nelson says Louis was shot and his body dumped months before it was found. Louis, who was honourably discharged from the Marines, was originally from New Roads, Louisiana. He was last seen in 1983 boarding a bus in Berkeley, California, for North Carolina, where he lived in Jacksonville.