Photo: Rickie Keefer
CONCORD — Someone recently discovered a woman’s corpse by a trash dumpster. One day later police arrested a suspect in her rape and murder, a previously convicted felon.
In the first place, a security guard making his rounds on August 22 found the victim. Her body was behind a store on the 2700 block of Clayton Road, lying inside a fenced enclosure, near a trash dumpster.
As a result, the security guard alerted police. Concord detectives working with forensic experts from the Contra Costa County Crime Lab determined the victim was raped and murdered.
Investigators reviewed recordings from several security cameras in the area. Recorded images show the suspect arriving and leaving the area where the guard discovered the victim.
The cameras recorded a clear image of the suspect’s vehicle, which ultimately led to his arrest. On August 23, a Concord police sergeant on patrol spotted a parked vehicle resembling the suspect’s vehicle.
The man found asleep in the driver’s seat looked like the suspect recorded by the cameras. Police questioned the suspect, and potential evidence linking him to the victim was located inside his vehicle.
Authorities said the suspect apparently lives inside his car. His last known local address is in Antioch.
Rickie Keefer, 58, was subsequently arrested. He remains in custody at the Martinez Detention Facility. His charges are rape and murder. His bail is $1.1 million.
Similarly, Keefer has several prior criminal convictions in California and Illinois, for burglary, narcotics, robbery and theft.
