Iowa Truck Driver Arrested After DNA Links Him To Cold Cases In Tennessee And Wyoming

A truck driver from Iowa was in police custody Friday, suspected in multiple unsolved homicides in Tennessee and Wyoming in the early 1990s. Authorities also are looking into any possible connections between the driver and other unsolved homicides across the U.S. since the early 1980s.

Clark Perry Baldwin, 58, was arrested at his home in Waterloo, Iowa, after his DNA allegedly ws linked to the cold cases. He was charged with four counts of murder and was booked at Black Hawk County Jail. He is being held without bail and is expected to be extradited to Tennessee in coming days.

The death of Pamela Rose Aldridge McCall, 33, in Spring Hill, Tennessee, on March 10, 1991, is the oldest of the three cases with which Baldwin was charged. McCall’s body was found near a local parkway wearing torn clothing and suffering from visible injuries to her hands and neck. She was strangled and 24 weeks pregnant at the time of her death.

The two Wyoming cases occurred in 1992. Police found two women killed in manners similar to McCall. However, the women have remained unidentified since their bodies were first found.

The first Wyoming victim, dubbed“Bitter Creek Betty,” was found near the Bitter Creek in Sweetwater County in March 1992. The second victim, dubbed “I-90 Jane Doe,” was found dumped along the interstate the following month.

Lawrenceburg, Tennessee, District Attorney General Brent Cooper said a cold case investigator submitted new evidence to the Spring Hill police for DNA testing. Investigators were able to develop a DNA profile of the possible suspect, matching the profile in the Wyoming cases.

Baldwin became a person of interest when the DNA profile was connected to relatives through commercial DNA databases. Cooper said FBI and Iowa police then gathered Baldwin’s DNA in secret by collecting trash and found it was a match to the cases.

“I'm also very happy to be able to give Rose McCall's mother a chance to see justice for her daughter's and granddaughter's murders,” Cooper told reporters. “As she put it in a recent phone call, ‘At least I have a grave to visit. Some moms don’t even [have] that.”

Baldwin’s profile is also being tested against three similar cold cases provided by Jody Ewing, an operator of the Iowa Cold Cases website, who told the Associated Press she gave authorities more than 20 unsolved cases dating back to 1980.

Baldwin was previously accused of raping a hitchhiker at gunpoint while driving though Texas in 1992. The woman identified Baldwin as the rapist and he allegedly admitted to the crime, but was not prosecuted.

He was arrested again in 1997 after his apartment in Springfield, Missouri, was raided by Secret Service agents for allegedly producing counterfeit money. He was convicted alongside two female accomplices and served 18 months in prison.