CASES LIVE ON AS WORK CONTINUES; DETECTIVES WON'T GIVE UP TRYING.

Byline: Lisa Mascaro Daily News Staff Writer

Nearly two years after Monica Lynne Leech was killed, the case continues to be talked about as much as ever in one place: where Ventura County sheriff's detectives hold a meeting.

At the meeting last week, detectives on the case talked about possible new leads in the unsolved murder of the bank teller, shot during a robbery in Thousand Oaks in 1997. They were setting out again on a path they hoped would lead to a solution.

``It's difficult to explain the relationship a detective has with a case. It's personal,'' said Cmdr. Dick Purnell of the Ventura County Sheriff's Department. ``The case is not a dead end. We consider it an active case.''

Leech's death is among a handful of unsolved crimes in eastern Ventura County, including unsolved murders and serial rapes in Simi Valley, that law-enforcement officials continue to investigate long after the time trails seem hot.

As they juggle regular caseloads, detectives in the sheriff's major crimes unit, which handles investigations in Thousand Oaks, and in the Simi Valley Police Department continue to chip away at older cases on the books.

``There's one or two of the cases we feel are kind of promising. Then there are a couple of the cases you do feel like you go down the road more than once, and it's the same answer,'' said Lt. Ken Tacke, who heads the Simi Valley Police Department's detective unit. ``You do question. What did we miss here? Did we miss anything, or is it one of those things where somebody's going to get away with it?''

Tacke was a young detective called out to the scene in October 1983 when Robin April Brooks, a 43-year-old artist, was killed in her Simi Valley mobile home by multiple gunshots.

Since the police department was founded in 1971, the Brooks case is the oldest of six unsolved murders still listed on a board for discussion at quarterly meetings of detectives, their sergeant and district attorney investigators.

There have been 79 homicides in Simi Valley since the department was founded, and all but the six have been solved. The unsolved cases are frustrating.

``You don't want to let those (go),'' said Tacke.

Because there is no statute of limitations on murder, the cases remain open until they are solved. Prosecution is barred sooner in other felonies and in lesser misdemeanors.

As technology advances, detectives can get new help - as from the state's DNA lab - to try to solve some of the old crimes. And they can simply rely on old-fashioned detective work, re-examining evidence, re-interviewing witnesses who have told their stories again and again.

At the Ventura office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, what's called the ``cold case squad'' may start from ground zero, asking questions that may not have been asked before, said supervising officer Dave Nesbitt.

``It takes a certain knack, a certain type of individual, to take a cold case file and say let's start at zero,'' said Nesbitt.

But often, officials said, they close their update meetings with few new leads.

For example, detectives keep looking for the Simi Valley rapist whom they have tied to rapes and other assaults from 1996 until March of 1998.

The detectives have interviewed known sex offenders living in the area, who are required to register with a statewide database. They have taken DNA samples from some to see if their DNA matches evidence from the crime scenes, said Tacke.

Plus, they have brought in outside investigators unfamiliar with the case, to look over their shoulders and provide fresh insight. They have called on the criminal profilers, in hopes of establishing a better identity of the rapist.

``In that case, it's a little perplexing,'' said Tacke.

Often, police have to sit through further crime sprees, as Thousand Oaks did with a notorious house burglar, who hit some 40 or 50 homes more than a year ago before police could track down the suspect and make an arrest.

``You tend to go over your tracks again to see if you missed anything,'' said Thousand Oaks Police Chief Kathy Kemp. ``There may be just that small lead that could lead to something else.''

Such continued investigation over what seems to be the same round of questions with a new round of interviewers can weigh on family and friends of the victims, who are trying to cope with their lives and move on from their grief, officials said.

But it is just that retelling over time that some investigators say can provide the information to help unravel stories that have not yet been told.

``It's not that things that weren't done to the extent that they should have been done initially,'' said Tacke, but rather that the interviewees could tell the story differently. ``They're not intimidated, they're not still in love with that person. You might get some different answers.''

In the case of Leech, the Thousand Oaks mother of two shot in the bank robbery, investigators are hopeful that time may be on their side as they persist in efforts to track down the teller's assailant.

``Sometimes over time, that fear factor goes away and various people will open up,'' said Purnell. ``In Monica's case, that is one of the things we hope will happen for us.''

But for other major cases, time simply leaves the police going over the same facts they have been investigating for years, such as the case of Brooks, whose family Tacke said called on the anniversary of her death one year to see if there were any new developments.

``I can't think of anything that jumps out at me, that says coulda, shoulda,'' said Tacke. ``I can't really think of anything out of that, anything left unturned.''

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Photo

PHOTO (Ran in Conejo and AV Editions only) Simi Valley Detective Bill Daniels, left, and Lt. Ken Tacke often review information from other agencies.

Michael Owen Baker/Daily News