Troy James O’Meara was 17 when he threatened Linda Reed on her lunch break at Pacific Fair Shopping Centre in Broadbeach and forced her to drive to a remote location where he restrained, sexually assaulted and drowned her in a creek.
O’Meara pleaded guilty to her rape and murder in early March and was today sentenced to 20 years jail.
It took detectives 35 years to finally track down O’Meara using DNA profiling.
It was a new examination of the fingerprint found in Ms Reed’s Toyota van which pointed them to O’Meara, who was never looked at by investigators in 1983.
“Troy James O’Meara murdered my wife, future children and my chances of being a father,” Ms Reed’s husband Robert said in a statement.
O’Meara, now 54, is already serving a life sentence for killing Ms O’Brien.
He will be eligible for parole in 2022.
This content first appear on 9news