Georgia man arrested in 1985 church murders of Black couple after original suspect spent 2 decades in prison

A southeast Georgia man was arrested and charged in the 1985 killing of a couple at a Black church after the original suspect — who spent 20 years behind bars — was exonerated on DNA evidence, authorities said.

Erik Kristensen Sparre, 61, was jailed on charges of felony murder and aggravated assault in the killings of Harold and Thelma Swain, the Georgia Bureau of Investigation said in a news release Monday. Sparre was arrested nearly four decades after the couple was fatally shot inside Rising Daughter Baptist Church in coastal Camden County.

Sparre became the focus of a renewed investigation into the Swains' deaths after authorities concluded they had initially prosecuted the wrong man.