CHARLOTTESVILLE — Six years after college student Morgan Harrington disappeared from outside a rock concert here, the man who has long been suspected in her death appeared in court Wednesday for the first time to face charges in the case.
After a brief hearing in Albemarle County Circuit Court, prosecutors said they do not plan to seek the death penalty against Jesse L. Matthew Jr. in connection with Harrington’s 2009 killing. But the former hospital orderly is facing a capital murder charge in the 2014 slaying of University of Virginia student Hannah Graham.
As the hearing began, Matthew, 33, passed within feet of Harrington’s parents, who saw him for the first time since authorities announced Tuesday evening that he had been charged with first-degree murder and abduction with intent to defile in their daughter’s death. Matthew looked briefly at the couple.
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After the hearing, Morgan’s father, Dan Harrington, acknowledged the moment.
“He knows we were there,” Harrington said. “I want him to know that we are present. We’ve been present for the last six years, and we will be present for the months to come.”
The couple wore purple and pink in memory of their daughter, and Gil Harrington, Morgan’s mother, said they had waited for this day. Over the years, the couple had repeatedly asked anyone with information about their daughter’s death to come forward and had become involved in efforts to help find other missing people.
“Six years is a long time,” Gil Harrington said. “I think about those years from Christmases to meals to relationships. That all stopped for Morgan six years ago. Murder and crimes of such violence destroy families and decimate communities.”
Authorities said they got a significant break in Harrington’s case when Matthew was arrested in Graham’s killing last September. Graham, an 18-year-old from Fairfax County, was last seen walking with Matthew on a downtown mall near the University of Virginia campus. Matthew was arrested in that case weeks later after a nationwide manhunt. Graham’s body was discovered in October.
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Authorities previously have said they established a forensic link between the Graham case and the Harrington case, but they did not offer details. The Charlottesville Daily Progress reported that authorities said in a search warrant that there is a match between DNA found on a cigar in Matthew's wallet and a T-shirt Harrington was wearing the night she disappeared.
Morgan Harrington, 20, a Virginia Tech student, was last seen trying to catch a ride outside John Paul Jones Arena in Charlottesville on Oct. 17, 2009. She had gone to the arena for a Metallica concert but became separated from her friends when she went outside to use the bathroom and could not get back inside. Her purse and cellphone were later found in the arena’s parking lot.
Matthew had worked as a cabdriver in Charlottesville, although it was unclear whether he was working at the time Harrington vanished.
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Her disappearance drew widespread attention and sparked massive searches. In November 2009, a T-shirt for the band Pantera, which she was wearing the night she disappeared, was discovered near a row of apartments in Charlottesville. Then, in January 2010, Harrington’s body was discovered in a remote hayfield on a farm southwest of Charlottesville.
In June, Matthew was convicted in a third case involving a 2005 sexual assault in Fairfax County. In that case, Matthew grabbed a woman in a Fairfax City neighborhood, beat and sexually assaulted her and then fled when he was startled by someone passing by. He will be sentenced in that case in October.
In court Wednesday, a judge appointed capital public defender Douglas Ramseur to represent Matthew. Ramseur, who has declined to comment, is also representing Matthew in the Graham case, which is scheduled to go to trial in July.
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Outside the courthouse, Gil Harrington said her family now shares a “bizarre, obscene link” to the Graham family. She said that on Wednesday morning, she and her husband visited Copley Road Bridge in Charlottesville, where her daughter was last seen, and tied a purple ribbon to the bridge for Morgan, an orange ribbon for Hannah and a black ribbon to mark their deaths.
“The same person stopped the hearts of our girls,” Gil Harrington said.
Jouvenal reported from Washington.
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