Police believe the killer fled in Rachael's car. A single hair retrieved at the autopsy revealed the killer's race - African American. Believing that Rachael's missing car was the key to solving the case, the Raver family focused their search on finding the car. Veronica Raver, Rachel's mother, spent her free time driving the streets and highways around Washington looking for that car. Six weeks after the murder, Veronica received a parking ticket for Rachael's missing Toyota sedan. The car had been ticketed for illegal parking on a street in Queens, New York. The date on the ticket was the day after the murders - two days before the bodies were discovered. By the time the car was recovered, there wasn't much left of it, but it was processed extensively and a number of latent fingerprints were lifted. Despite the lead, authorities were unable to identify any suspects.

Veronica Raver refused to give up. Almost a full year after the murders, an episode of Unsolved Mysteries caught her attention. On May 11th, 1988, the body of a young woman was found in an Arlington, Virginia schoolyard. She had been sexually assaulted and shot once at point blank range. The victim was 24-year-old Veronica "Tina" Jefferson, a newcomer to the Washington, DC area. Veronica Raver believed there might be a connection. But the discrepancies between the cases were significant. Rachael Raver and Warren Fulton were white while Tina Jefferson was African American. Rachael was in the company of her boyfriend and Tina was alone. And while investigators believed Tina knew her killer, it was suspected that the attack on Rachael and Warren had been random. Years would pass and both murder investigations would grow cold until the spring of 2000, when a technician at Biotech 2, Virginia's state DNA lab, was routinely running comparisons on samples submitted by law enforcement agencies. The technician was able to develop the most vital lead either of these cases had had to date and would prove Veronica Raver's initial instincts were on the mark. The DNA proved that the same person who killed Tina murdered Rachael Raver and Warren Fulton. Investigators also now had confirmation that a serial killer was on the loose.

UPDATE: An inmate on California’s death row has been charged with the murders of Warren Fulton, Rachael Raver, and Tina Jefferson.  Authorities say that last year DNA taken from Rolando Alfredo Prieto matched that found at the crime scenes.   Police expect to return Prieto to Virginia to stand trial in the case.