Man charged in 7-year-old girl's 1984 murder

HILLSBOROUGH -- A man convicted of killing a Chapel Hill girl in the mid-1980s has been charged with murdering a girl in Carrboro in 1984.

George Richard Fisher appeared in court on the new charges this afternoon in Hillsborough.

Fisher, who has been in prison, is charged with first-degree murder, rape, kidnapping and arson, said Orange County District Attorney Jim Woodall said.

He is accused of killing Carrie Wilkerson, 7, who was found dead in February 1984, said Capt. J.G. Booker of the Carrboro Police Department.

"Some new evidence has come about," Booker said, referring questions to the district attorney.

Wilkerson was found strangled and sexually assaulted inside her burning home in Rocky Brook Trailer Park in Carrboro.

Investigators with the State Bureau of Investigation and the Carrboro Police Department linked Fisher to the case using DNA evidence that was not available during the original investigation.

Woodall said a call about possible new information led investigators to reopen the case. The call turned out to be a false lead, but it led investigators to review a rape kit collected in 1984.

The rape kit had been reviewed once before, but the technology to test for DNA did not exist until recently, Woodall said.

Fisher was led into the Orange County Superior Court room in handcuffs and a chain around his waist. He shifted on his feet as Judge Abraham Penn Jones asked him if he had any questions. He shook his head no.

Afterward, Carrie's stepmother, Norma Shivers, said it was odd to see her daughter's accused killer.

"It was strange. Just to know he's that close, to know he's in the same room with me," she said.

Shivers said Fisher was her best friend's husband at the time. "He was very meek and mild," she said.

Fisher was convicted in 1985 of the strangulation, rape and murder of 8-year-old Jean Fewel in Chapel Hill.

Fewel was kidnapped while walking to school and was later found hanging from a tree near Finley Golf Course.