Suspect Identified in 2004 California Beach Killings

California authorities believe they have finally solved the shocking slaying of two young Bible-camp counselors on a Northern California beach more than a decade ago.

The killings and the mysteries surrounding them long had drawn national attention: 22-year-old Lindsay Cutshall and her 26-year-old fiance, Jason Allen, were found next to each other on a driftwood-strewn beach near the Sonoma County village of Jenner on Aug. 18, 2004.

The two Bible-camp workers were still zipped into their sleeping bags on the beach about 80 miles (130 kilometers) north of San Francisco, and authorities believe they were shot in the head as they slept.

"Many of us will never forget when Sonoma County was rocked by the discovery of a young innocent couple found murdered on a Sonoma County beach," Sheriff Steve Freitas said Friday.

This spring, authorities arrested a Sonoma County man, Shaun Gallon, 38, in the unrelated March 17 fatal shooting of his brother, Freitas told reporters Friday. Freitas said Gallon had come under scrutiny earlier in the beach killings, but authorities gave no details why.

Questioned about the 2004 killings while in custody now, Gallon had relayed "information about the killings that no other person could have known," the sheriff said of the 2004 case. Authorities have since found further corroborating evidence, he said.

"We feel confident we have Jason and Lindsay's killer," Freitas said.

Gallon was arrested and charged with murder on March 25 for the shooting death of his younger brother. Investigators say Gallon shot his 36-year-old brother in the home they shared with their mother. Police say they recovered an assault-style rifle they believe Gallon assembled.

He is being held in the Sonoma County Jail without bail, but he has not yet been charged in the beach killings, Freitas said.

Authorities never charged anyone in the 2004 killings, and no motive has ever been made public, though the sheriff said Gallon had initially been a "person of interest" in the case.

Authorities have said neither victim was robbed or sexually assaulted.

Cutshall, a native of Fresno, Ohio, and Allen, from Zeeland, Michigan, were on a weekend trip. They worked at a Christian youth camp in California's Sierra Nevada foothills. They had been due to marry within weeks.

Freitas said authorities believed the killing of the young couple was random, and that there was no previous connection between the two and the suspect.

Authorities previously said they also were still trying to find a motive in the shooting death of Gallon's brother, Shamus, saying there was no known conflict between the two before the shooting.

In a statement read by the sheriff, the dead couple's parents thanked law enforcement, whose "humanity and professionalism would not allow them to give up the case."

The parents' statement also offered prayers for the suspect "who heartlessly committed this crime" and for the people around the beach town of Jenner, who had described themselves as haunted by the case.