RACINE — Lucas Alonso, the 66-year-old man who allegedly killed a woman in 2000 but was never apprehended is now behind bars with a $1 million bond.
Alonso, of Zion, Illinois, was charged Wed., March 8, in Racine County Circuit Court with a single count of first-degree intentional homicide. If convicted, he faces the rest of his life in prison.
Alonso says he walked away
According to the criminal complaint, Alonso strangled Linda Fields, 37, in February of 2000 after they were seen leaving a local bar together. Alonso told police he and Fields were dropped off at the lakefront and had sex under a tree.
When Fields tried to end the encounter, Alonso said he got angry and choked her, the complaint continues. He said he let her go when she realized she couldn’t breathe and yelled at him when he walked away. Fields’ body was found the next day.
Despite DNA being collected from Fields, her killer remained at large because neither the Wisconsin
DNA databank, the Wisconsin convicted felons databank, nor the national DNA databank found a match. The case went cold until 2020 when former police Chief Art Howell directed investigators to re-examine the case, per the complaint.
Using a familial DNA search — when the DNA of a perpetrator is entered into a number of databases for potential matches with blood relatives of an assailant — detectives located two brothers who were eliminated from consideration. According to the criminal complaint, they also located their father, later identified as Alonso. He was arrested on Feb. 23, 2023, during a traffic stop on Douglas Avenue.
During a press conference Wednesday, March 8, carried live by TMJ4 News, Fields’ son, Carl Fields, said finding his mother’s killer serves as the beginning of their journey toward closure.
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