Newspaper carrier's death due to stabbing

The medical examiner's office finds a single strand of hair, but no indication of rape is made in the autopsy report

RALEIGH -- An autopsy report made public Thursday showed that the newspaper carrier killed near the State Farmers Market last month died of a single stab wound to the neck, but the report does not indicate she had been raped.

Physicians at the state medical examiner's office in Chapel Hill collected evidence from Jennifer Kathleen Nielsen's body to help police determine whether she had been raped. When Nielsen, 22, was found by a patrol officer, her pants had been pulled down past her buttocks, and she did not have on a top.

"Based on the circumstances and how she was at the scene, we wanted to cover all the bases," said Clyde Gibbs, a medical examiner's specialist who was present at the autopsy.

The medical examiner's office found a single strand of hair on the back of Nielsen's right hand and turned it over to investigators.

Nielsen, a married mother of two small children and eight months pregnant, was found June 14 by a police officer behind the AmeriKing Food Mart and Exxon station at Lake Wheeler Road and Centennial Boulevard. She moved to Fuquay-Varina from Salt Lake City in August and was due to give birth July 8 to a son she had already named Ethen.

Nielsen was working as a newspaper carrier for USA Today. The AmeriKing was one of her first stops. Police think someone killed Nielsen between 3 and 4 a.m., while the AmeriKing was closed.

A homeless man found a bloodied pocketknife less than a quarter-mile from where she died, and it was turned over to police.

Police released a composite sketch of a person they want to question and have set up a hot line for tips. Nielsen's family has put up posters in the area where she was found, and USA Today's parent company has offered a $10,000 reward for information leading to the capture of her killer. The Lillington company where Nielsen's husband and father work also has offered a $10,000 reward.

Detectives working the case have received more than 300 calls, Jim Sughrue, a Raleigh police spokesman, said Thursday.

"They are following up on each and every one of them," Sughrue said.

In addition to the stab wound that killed her, Nielsen had a little more than a half-dozen bruises and abrasions on her upper right chest, left elbow, right knee and left shin, according to the autopsy report.