UINTAH COUNTY, Utah — Exactly 52 years after Army veteran Gregory Nickell was murdered in Utah, an arrest has finally been made in connection to the 1972 crime.
Darrel Eugene Choate, 74, was taken into custody Tuesday at a Salt Lake City hospital by Unitah County Sheriff's deputies. While a warrant for Choate's arrest was issued on Nov. 1, medical issues prevented him from being arrested on that date, according to the sheriff's office.
Choate has since been moved to Vernal where he is being held in the Uintah County Jail.
Back on Nov. 26, 1972, Nicklell and a woman were sitting in a car at a Highway 40 rest area when a man approached and claimed there had been a crash and needed help. The man then pulled out a gun and shot Nickell multiple times.
The man then drove Nickell's car where he and another suspect, one of whom was allegedly Choate, burned the vehicle on a backroad with Nickell's body inside. Before the car was set on fire, the 18-year-old woman said she was taken from the vehicle and raped by Choate and the other man.
Choate and his accomplice then drove for hours with the woman before pulling over near Duchesne and raping her again. The men let the woman go afterward and told her to walk to a nearby house for help.
In 2019, evidence sent to the Utah State Crime Lab for DNA processing led to the other man being identified as Daniel Arthur Bell, who had died that same year. Bell had moved away from Utah in 1972 and was later convicted of rape in Oregon before moving to Washington after being paroled in 1999.
According to a probable cause statement, interviews with Bell's wife in Washington revealed that her husband told her his friend "Gene" had been involved in a rape that took place in Washington.
DNA collected from Choate by law enforcement during an unrelated call was compared with a sample from the other suspect in 1972 and was declared to be a direct match.
Choate is known to have a criminal history and lived in Uintah, Carbon, and Duchesne counties in Utah, as well as Washington, Oregon, Arizona, Idaho, Nevada, New Mexico and Texas.
The sheriff's office is looking to speak with anyone who may have known Choate or could have information about the case.
