Monica Leech, a 39-year-old mother of two, had been working at a California bank for only a few weeks when two men robbed it in 1997, according to reports.

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Handcuffed and on her knees in the Thousand Oaks bank’s vault with three other employees, Leech died when one of the men shot her point-blank in the back of the head, SF Gate reported.

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“It was absolutely unprovoked,” Ventura County chief deputy Bob Brooks said at the time, according to the news outlet.

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Now new evidence in the 26-year-old cold case has led to an arrest, the Ventura County Sheriff’s Office said in a March 14 news release.

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Kevin Ray James, 55, of San Bernardino faces charges including murder, deputies said. Investigators arrested him March 9 after reopening the case in 2021.

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The original investigation zeroed in on James as a suspect in the April 28, 1997, robbery of Western Financial Bank but lacked enough evidence to arrest him, the sheriff’s office said.

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New evidence, including DNA evidence, led to his arrest, investigators said.

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Investigators ask that anyone with information call 805-383-8704 or email coldcase@ventura.org.

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Thousand Oaks is a city of 125,000 people about 40 miles west of Los Angeles.

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