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ManmurderPORT WASHINGTON (AP) —A man convicted this year of murdering an Appleton woman in 1980 faces charges that he raped and killed another Wisconsin teenager four years ago while ‘'making a run for girls.James A. Duquette Jr., 33, sentenced to life in prison in Massachusetts for the kidnapping and rape of a 13-year-old girl, was charged Thursday in the killing of 14-year-old Tara Kassens of the town of Cedarburg.District Attorney Sandy Williams charged Duquette with first-degree murder, second-degree sexual assault, kidnapping and false imprisonment.Tara’s body was found in a remote, wooded area in the Milwaukee suburb of Mequon on July 4th, 1987 — four days after she disappeared during a bicycle ride.Her skull was fractured, and she had been stabbed and raped. Her bicycle was found near her hidden body.Police initially had few clues in the case, but Duquette, arrested in the Southhampton, Mass., rape case in June 1988, was found to have a newspaper clipping about the Kassens death in his wallet.Mequon Police Chief Patrick Call said at a news conference today the clipping was key to the investigation.Call said he believes Duquette is a serial killer who was out on the prowl when he took Tara.This is a cold, calculated, devious crime — planned, he said.When Duquette was convicted in the Appleton murder case last June, Call said he believed there was enough evidence to charge him with the Kassens murder.The criminal complaint filed Thursday quoted two inmates at the Outagamie County Jail as saying Duquette told them he killed Tara Kassens. He told one inmate he was making a run for girls when he found her riding a bike, the complaint said.Duquette, asked by an inmate why he had a news clipping about the Mequon case, told him he liked to read about what he did to the girl, the complaint said.It also quoted the inmate as saying Duquette told him he had asked the girl for directions, and when she refused to help him, he grabbed her off the bicycle, took her to another spot, beat, raped and killed her.The second inmate told authorities Duquette said he liked to drag his victim to the ground and strike them in the face as a way of controlling them before raping them, the complaint said.It said he told the second inmate he stabbed the Kassens girl at least once in the chest and then raped her a second time, and that he killed her so that she could not identify him.Dead people can’t talk, he allegedly told the inmate.In the Appleton case, Duquette was sentenced to life plus five years in prison for the 1980 murder of Anne Preimesberger, 18, whose body was found Easter Sunday 1980 near a highway embankment m the town of Grand Chute.Duquette was implicated by oneof two other men who authorities said picked the victim up in their car before raping and killing her and dumping the body.m
Newspaper Details
Eau Claire Leader Telegram
Eau Claire, Wisconsin, US
Fri, Dec 13, 1991
Page 4
Full Page
Clipped by
Brandi W.
GA, USA 07 Sep 2021
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