For nearly two decades, Lenexa Police Det. James Rader looked at a picture of Maria Morfin-Rojas on an almost daily basis.
“She had virtually no family here in the Kansas City area,” Rader said. “She had an aunt and uncle here, but her children were gone. I didn’t feel like she had anyone really fighting for her.”
Tod Palmer/KSHBMorfin-Rojas, who was 30 at the time, was stabbed to death sometime after leaving work on Sept. 9, 2005, inside her apartment near West 77th Street and Quivira Road.
Lenexa police quickly developed Angel Herrera as a suspect, but he’d already stolen Morfin-Rojas’ car and fled to Mexico before her body was found.
“I kept her picture up — also a picture of Herrera — just to remind me that that case was still out there and to not forget about it,” Rader said.
That dogged determination paid off last month when Rader traveled nearly 2,500 miles to bring Herrera back to Johnson County to face justice, bringing a measure of closure to one of the longest — and at times most frustrating — cases of his career.