Woman murdered by "Happy Face" serial killer identified after 29 years, police say

A woman who was murdered by Keith Jesperson, the "Happy Face" serial killer, has been identified decades after her death, police said in a news release. 

Jesperson is serving multiple life sentences after confessing to murdering eight women in multiple states between 1990 and 1995, and was known as the Happy Face killer because he wrote notes to the media that he signed with a smiley face. In February 1996, he told an investigator from the Okaloosa County Sheriff's Office that he had killed one of the women in 1994 and dumped her body along Interstate 10 in Oregon. Jesperson did not identify the woman, saying that he believed her name was "Susan" or "Suzette." 

A prison work crew found the body on Sept. 14, 1994. At the time, the only thing investigators could determine was that the body was that of a white female likely between the ages of 35 and 55. A facial reconstruction made at the time did not generate any leads.