St. Cloud, Fla. — A cold case dating back more than 30 years has been solved with the arrest of Gene Stuller, 72, of Apopka. He was taken into custody on April 21, 2025, in connection with the 1991 murder of 27-year-old Julia Sue Wilbanks.
Wilbanks’s body was discovered on September 23, 1991, off Neptune Road in St. Cloud. She had been brutally stabbed 17 times, including fatal wounds to her heart. The investigation into her death began when an officer, returning from court, was flagged down by individuals who had found her body.
While the case eventually went cold, St. Cloud Police Chief Douglas Goerke emphasized that it was never forgotten. Over the years, investigators had tried to match blood found on Wilbanks’s clothing to potential suspects but with no success. In 2012, a breakthrough came when the DNA was submitted for genetic genealogy analysis.
The investigation took a significant turn in early 2025 when it led detectives to Stuller, who had lived near Wilbanks’s last known address in 1991. In March 2025, surveillance efforts led to the collection of a discarded item—a straw—containing Stuller’s DNA. The DNA match confirmed him as the primary suspect.
Stuller was arrested at his Apopka home, where he has lived for nearly two decades. His neighbors described him as a friendly and outgoing man, shocked by the arrest. Despite his previous arrests for DUI and drug paraphernalia, Stuller had no felony convictions.
Facing charges of second-degree murder and disturbing a dead body, Stuller’s arrest brings justice to Wilbanks’s family after more than three decades. Chief Goerke remarked that “cold cases are never forgotten” and praised advancements in science for making it possible to solve crimes that once seemed impossible to crack.
