New Evidence Revealed In Mia Zapata Murder Case

Jesus C. Mezquia, 48, of Marathon in the Florida Keys, was charged with first-degree murder after DNA evidence tied him to the death of Mia Zapata. He is being held without bail at the Miami-Dade County Jail on a fugitive warrant for murder and violation of probation.

Zapata, the 27-year-old lead singer of the Gits, was found dead on a street in Seattle's Central Area on July 7, 1993. She had been beaten, raped and strangled with the drawstring of her Gits sweat shirt.

At a bond hearing Monday, Mezquia told Senior County Court Judge Gerald Klein that he plans to contest his extradition, said assistant state attorney Pamela England.

Mezquia will be assigned a public defender to represent him at an extradition hearing on Feb. 12.

Seattle police also have evidence placing Mezquia in Seattle, KIRO 7 Eyewitness News has learned.

Five weeks after the murder, a woman told police that a man drove up beside her and committed lewd conduct. She wrote down the license plate. The car was registered to Mezquia and the incident took place blocks from where Zapata disappeared.

"That lewd conduct case was a very strong link for detectives to be able to work back and place him in this area in 1993," said Seattle police spokesman Duane Fish.

In Seattle, the King County Prosecutor's Office filed the first-degree murder charge on Thursday. If convicted, Mezquia faces 20 years to life in prison.

Because Zapata was raped, it's possible that Mezquia's charge could be amended to aggravated first-degree murder -- the crime in Washington state that can carry the death penalty.

"We're going to have to look into that a little more," said Dan Donohoe, spokesman for the King County Prosecutor's Office. "It's still too early for us to speculate."

The DNA sample that led to Mezquia's arrest was saliva swabbed from Zapata's body, which "bore obvious signs of assault and abrasions," according to court documents.

When Zapata's body was found, her bra had been torn and her underwear had been stuffed in the left front pocket of her jeans. The medical examiner said cord-like wounds around her neck indicated she had been strangled with the drawstring of her sweat shirt.

"Additionally, the autopsy revealed that a prolonged and painful struggle had transpired," court documents said. "Zapata had suffered blunt impact to her stomach area; her diaphragm and liver were lacerated."

Mezquia, who was arrested Friday, has a rap sheet in Miami-Dade County dating back to 1981.

That year he was charged with three felonies: attempted facilitation of a capital felony, false imprisonment and robbery by force. Mezquia was also charged with carrying a concealed firearm, carrying a pistol without a license and possession of a short-barreled gun that year. County records did not say whether Mezquia was convicted on any of those charges.

Zapata was little-known nationally but popular locally at the height of Seattle's grunge-rock scene in the early '90s. Her death prompted an all-night vigil attended by 1,000 people as well as the creation of a self-defense group, Home Alive.

The Seattle music community -- including Pearl Jam, Nirvana and Soundgarden -- raised $70,000 to hire a private investigator for three years, but eventually the funds dried up.