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19 Action News
January 19, 2015
A man already serving time for murder in an Ohio prison has entered an Alford plea to charges he killed a Toledo woman back in 1976.
Martin Woods entered the plea Friday in the murder of Rebecca Gerst.
Gerst was found dead in the 2200 block of Parkwood Avenue in central Toledo on February 4, 1976. Police say a witness heard a disturbance in Gerst’s apartment that evening, then heard someone running down the stairs. The next morning Gerst was found dead with a laceration to her neck.
Woods is already serving a term in the North Central Correctional Facility in Marion, Ohio for a murder which occurred in 1989.
An Alford plea does not mean that Martin admits he committed the murder, but does admit that the evidence against him is likely enough for a conviction.
Gerst’s 81-year-old mother says she never thought she would see this day.
“I still feel like I’m dreaming,” Shirley Gerst said. “[The prosecutors and police] did a lot of work,and the two detectives were absolutely wonderful.”
Chief Lucas County Criminal Prosecutor Jeff Lingo says Woods was a known acquaintance of the victim, but that there was not enough evidence to charge him at the time of the murder.
Officials say the work of a cold case task force and new scientific techniques cracked the case. Woods was indicted for the murder on April 8, 2014.
“Because of advances in science, we were able to review the evidence seized from 1976. And with the results of that review of evidence, we were able to take this to a grand jury,” said Lingo.
Woods took a plea deal, pleading to a charge of involuntary manslaughter. He received the maximum sentence of 11 years, which will be added to the sentence he is already serving.
“Clearly there is only one place for you to be to maintain the safety of the public, because anyone that crosses your path is at risk,” Common Pleas Judge Dean Mandros said to Woods.
The Toledo Police Department’s cold case unit has recently closed three cases. Two have included convictions, the third is waiting to go to trial.
