Pacific Beach resident Gerald Jackson had finished his late-night shift as a bartender before heading over to cruise Horton Plaza at 2:30 a.m. on chilly winter evening at the end of December 1971. Downtown then was a lot different from today’s Gaslamp District that draws millions of people boutique shopping and upscale dining. Within walking distance from City Hall, where Pete Wilson was sworn in as the city’s 27th mayor a few weeks earlier, were all-night adult movie houses, such as the Pussycat Theater, and rundown flophouses. Sailors flocked to the area, some renting lockers so they could change into civilian clothing. That night, Jackson met a former sailor who was down on his luck, cold, hungry and tired. The man agree to go with Jackson to his Pacific Beach apartment in the 1500 block of Hornblend Jackson offered the man scotch, fed him, and told him he could spend the night. When Jackson failed to show up at his post office job several days later, two friends of his showed up at his apartment on Jan. 2, 1972. They apparently forced their way inside and discovered Jackson’s nude body in his bedroom. He had been stabbed at least 55 times, court records say. Police investigators and technicians looked for clues in the apartment, and took numerous fingerprints and blood samples found at the crime scene. The investigation was so thorough that officers even saved a cigarette butt as evidence, a decade or more before crime labs began using DNA to link suspects to crimes. Police discovered that Jackson’s car was missing. It was a 1971 Ford Torino, a model that is no longer manufactured. Police put out a teletype notification to all law enforcement agencies after they determined the Torino was stolen. Also taken from the apartment was an AM/FM stereo receiver that was a Nivico model with a serial number. The car was found in Calexico on Jan. 6, 1972, and police there notified San Diego Police. Pawn shops in Calexico were checked, and amazingly, Jackson’s stereo receiver was found. On it, in dried blood, was a palm print. The fingerprints and palm prints were preserved. The person who pawned the stereo used Jackson’s stolen identification. Because of that, police issued a warrant for the arrest of anyone using the identification of Gerald Jackson. Police detectives interviewed Jackson’s friends, acquaintances, and even checked at gay bars and bathhouses, but no real lead was found. A list of military men who were on unauthorized leave was requested, along with their fingerprints, but produced no suspects. The fingerprints of Jackson’s friends and acquaintances were taken and they were eliminated as suspects in the crime since they didn’t match the fingerprints found at the scene and on the stereo. At the time, computer fingerprint analysis did not exist in 1972. Eventually, the police department inactivated the case. It took 37 years for technology to catch up to the investigation, when, on Jan. 20, 2008, Gabrielle Wimer, an intern assigned to the San Diego Police Department Homicide Cold Case Team requested the department re-examine the evidence collected from Jackson’s apartment. Investigators submitted the fingerprints to the FBI’s database, and on April 30, the FBI notified the Cold Case Team they had a match. Gerald Metcalf, 61, was living in a small Texas town with his wife of 30 years, when detectives knocked on his door. Police say his fingerprints and a bloody palm print on Jackson’s stolen stereo matches Metcalf’s prints. Metcalf’s DNA is on the cigarette butt, according to an arrest warrant declaration by Police Detective John Tefft. Metcalf was 24 years old at the time of the 1971 slaying. Metcalf has since been extradited to California and now resides in the downtown central jail on $1 million bail. Metcalf has pleaded not guilty and awaits a Jan. 15 preliminary hearing in San Diego Superior Court.