A boarder found her nude body in the kneeling position on the bed, sexually assaulted and strangled with a combination of her bra and a rag.
[3] Not long after, 78-year-old Mattie Mae McClendon on September 10, 1988, who lived near the Atlanta University Center and was found dead in her apartment by her sister.
[2] Although McClendon showed no signs of foul play, detectives still decided to investigate it as a homicide, as a window in her home had been broken.
On that day, 79-year-old retired practical nurse Johnnie Mae "John-John" Martin, a respected member of her neighborhood, was strangled in her bed with a shoelace, with the killer later searching through her house.
[10] Authorities started focusing on him after the September 30, 1992, robbery of 83-year-old Susie Sublett in Vine City, in which the intruder, later identified as Pace, threatened to shoot her with a .22 caliber pistol he found under a pillow.
The prosecutor, Attorney Herman Sloan, said that blood and hair samples from the accused matched the murder scenes, while the defense lawyer, Nancy Mau, argued that the scientific evidence meant nothing and that they were simply prosecuting a "convenient man.
"[12] On March 5, 1996, Lyndon Pace was convicted of the murders and other crimes, including the attempted rape of a 12-year-old girl in 1987 and the 1990 break-in of King's home.
In January 2005, following multiple other burglaries, Coretta Scott King moved away from the family home in Vine City to a new condominium in Buckhead.