LONGWOOD, Fla. – Seminole County deputies made a big break in the murder of a woman found naked and dumped in the woods 15 years ago.
Jackie Sheehan, 31, was found dead in 1998 in a wooded area of Longwood.
Tuesday night, investigators arrested her then live-in boyfriend, 42-year-old Rodney Bice, for her murder in upstate New York.
"It's changing my life again. The same way her death changed my life," Sheehan's sister Linda Call told Local 6. "We are finally getting justice for her. I wasn't going to give up on it."
Deputies arrested Bice in Canandaigua, N.Y. after getting a tip from someone in the area that implicated him in Sheehan's murder.
Sheehan's body was found April 20, 1998 in a wooded area on the south side of North Street, near its intersection with Bennett Avenue.
Sheehan was last seen five days before her body was discovered leaving the apartment she shared with Bice in Altamonte Springs after a dispute. Her body was found just two and half miles from where she lived with Bice.
The medical examiner said Sheehan had unspecified trauma to her head and neck.
"I want to see him pay with some time. He's already been free for 16 years," said Call. "Now, he's finally answering for it."
Sheehan and Bice had two children together. An 18-year-old daughter and a 16-year-old son who were both taken to New York by Bice just six months after Sheehan's death.
Investigators said Bice will be extradited back to Seminole County for his first court appearance.