EVERETT — In the summer of 1995, Todd Horton was 16. He had a job at McDonald’s. He was headed into his junior year at Cascade High School and mostly relied on parents and friends if he needed a ride.
Fast forward to 2014.
Horton, now 35, spent hours Monday in Snohomish County Superior Court answering questions about something he remembers seeing at a south Everett car wash early one July morning more than 19 years ago.
A man appeared to be hosing blood off items he was removing from a car, Horton said.
The stranger didn’t seem in a hurry or troubled that a couple of teenage boys were seated in a minivan nearby, eating food from Taco Bell, he said.
The guy was about 6 feet tall and wore his dark hair in a mullet. His jawline and cheekbones were pronounced; a face that made an impression.
Horton didn’t hesitate Monday when asked whether the man from the car wash was in the courtroom. He identified Danny Ross Giles, now on trail for first-degree murder in the “cold-case” killing of Patti Berry.
The testimony came as prosecutors introduced into evidence a composite sketch that Horton helped detectives prepare in 1999, four years after Berry’s killing.
Although Horton said he spotted the man at the car wash early on July 31, 1995 — during the hours Berry was last seen alive — he didn’t connect the event with her case. He told jurors on Monday that didn’t happen until 1999 when he read an article in The Herald from a six-part series on the case.
Berry’s blood-stained Honda had been found parked behind that car wash in 1995. Her body had been dumped south of the Everett Mall.
Detectives thought enough of Horton’s lead that they publicized the sketch in hopes of identifying the stranger he reported seeing.
There were tips, but also a dead end. Horton identified others he thought were dead ringers for the car wash guy. The lead went cold.
Nine years later, Giles became a suspect in the Berry case. His DNA reportedly was found on the steering wheel of Berry’s car using forensic techniques that weren’t available in 1995.
Detectives investigated and concluded that Berry’s killing unfolded in Giles’ back yard, deputy prosecutor Craig Matheson said in opening statements early last week. As he outlined the case, a screen in the courtroom was filled for several minutes with side-by-side images of the sketch based on Horton’s recollections and a Giles booking photo from the mid 1990s.
A moustache. A mullet. A distinctive jawline and prominent cheekbones.
Giles has denied any involvement in Berry’s killing. His attorneys told jurors he’s the victim of flawed forensic work and tunnel vision.
With dozens of questions Monday, public defender Linda Coburn highlighted numerous inconsistencies and contradictions over the years in Horton’s recall about the man at the car wash.
Early on he said the man wore hip boots. On Monday he thought he may have been in regular shoes. The guy had on a heavy coat. Or maybe it was a T-shirt? While working with the detective who prepared the composite sketch in 1999, he never mentioned the man’s jawline as being important, right?
Isn’t it true that he told detectives that he thought the person may be hosing off mud, not blood?
Coburn even demonstrated that Horton had a faulty memory about how many times he had identified people as resembling the man he spotted at the car wash. She confronted him with paperwork showing that happened twice before Giles became a suspect.
Horton kept his composure during the grilling. His recall was imperfect. He was trying to remember events from nearly 20 years ago, he said at one point.
After he finished testifying, Berry’s family met privately with Horton. They thanked him for coming forward.
Scott North: 425-339-3431; north@heraldnet.com. Twitter: @snorthnews.
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