RAYMAND VANNIEUWENHOVEN, 84, listens as defense attorney Lee Schuchart, not shown, concludes his opening statement July 19, the first day of a double homicide trial in Marinette County Circuit Court. The jury Tuesday convicted Vannieuwenhoven of two counts of first-degree murder in the deaths of 25-year-old David Schuldes and 24-year-old Ellen Matheys on July 9, 1976. (Brian Christensen/Daily News photo)

MARINETTE, Wis. — Both the prosecution and defense rested Monday a week after trial began for an 84-year-old man accused of killing a Green Bay, Wis., couple at a campground in Marinette County more than four decades ago.

Raymand Vannieuwenhoven is charged with two counts of first-degree murder — a felony punishable by up to life in prison — in the deaths of 25-year-old David Schuldes and 24-year-old Ellen Matheys on July 9, 1976.

The defense rested without calling any witnesses, according to a court official. The trial is set to resume today with closing arguments and jury instructions before the jury begins deliberations, the official said.

According to the criminal complaint, Schuldes was fatally shot through the neck with a .30 caliber firearm as he waited for Matheys outside a bathroom at the McClintock Park campground in the Town of Silver Cliff. The shooter then either ordered or chased Matheys into a nearby wooded area, where she was sexually assaulted and, after being allowed to put some of her clothing back on, shot twice in the torso.

Though the case went cold, Marinette County detectives continued to have DNA from semen left in Matheys’ shorts periodically analyzed to see if a possible match might surface, the complaint stated.

In 2018, investigators submitted evidence to Virginia-based Parabon Nanolabs, which traced the DNA to a specific couple with ties to the Green Bay area.

Further investigation led to Vannieuwenhoven, a widower living in Lakewood, Wis. A DNA sample obtained from Vannieuwenhoven in March 2019 proved to be a match.

“No one else in the world could have had that DNA profile but Ray,” Special Prosecutor Mark Williams said in his opening statement on July 19. “Literally, no one else in the world could have left that semen stain on Ellen Matheys’ shorts.”

Vannieuwenhoven originally also was charged with first-degree sexual assault, but that was dismissed in May 2019 because the statute of limitations had passed. There are no such limitations for homicide.

In his opening statement, defense attorney Lee Schuchart told jurors he and fellow attorney Travis Crowell would not challenge that the semen found in Matheys’ shorts belonged to anyone but Vannieuwenhoven, but said the state had to prove beyond any reasonable doubt he had shot and killed the couple.

“Semen didn’t kill these people,” Schuchart said. “Bullets killed these people.”

Schuchart said Vannieuwenhoven’s own .30-30 caliber rifle did not match bullet fragments at the crime scene.

“You have a connection to DNA in a pair of shorts, but you don’t have a connection of Ray to the shooting,” Schuchart told jurors. “That’s a critical distinction to make in this case.”