DNA evidence has identified the second suspect in what had been a 50 year old cold murder/rape case out of Uintah County and a murder charge has been filed. On November 26th, 1972, Gregory Dahl Nickell and his date were parked at the scenic overlook sometime after 1 a.m. when a man knocked on Nickell’s car window. Nickell, who had recently returned to Vernal after being honorably discharged from the Army, rolled the window down. The man said there had been a crash. He asked 21-year-old Nickell to drive into Vernal to report it. Nickell agreed to help. As he turned from the window, the man shot him with a .22-caliber pistol. The man fired at least three more shots into Nickell’s body before shoving him on top of the 18-year-old woman in the passenger seat, getting into the car and driving onto US-40. A second vehicle pulled up behind them, flashed its headlights and pulled around them. The kidnapper followed the second vehicle. The two men used gas from Nickell’s car to set his vehicle on fire with his body inside at a remote area near current day Brough Reservoir. Each man raped the woman before they left her on the side of the highway near Duchesne, about 60 miles from where she had been abducted. Forensic evidence collected from the woman at the hospital shortly after her kidnappers released her turned out to be the key to identifying the suspects; even though it took over five decades for science and technology to make it possible. In 2022, Daniel Arthur Bell, who died in 2019, was identified through extensive DNA testing as one of two men suspected of killing Gregory Dahl Nickell at a scenic overlook west of Vernal. On November 1st, Uintah County Sheriff’s Office announced that through further investigation and DNA testing they were able to identify the second suspect as 74-year-old Darrel Eugene Choate of Tooele. A warrant has been issued for Choate for the murder of Gregory Nickell.
