Chronology of Yosemite slayings case

Thursday, Oct. 21, 1999 | 9:48 a.m.

Developments in the four Yosemite National Park slayings this year:

Feb. 14 - Carole Sund, Juli Sund and Silvina Pelosso drive rental car to El Portal, Calif., and check into Cedar Lodge.

Feb. 15 - They visit Yosemite, returning to have dinner at the lodge restaurant.

Feb. 17 - Relatives report the trio missing the day after they miss a rendezvous at the San Francisco airport.

March 18 - Rental car found burned and abandoned along logging road. In the trunk are the bodies of Mrs. Sund, 42, and Miss Pelosso, 16.

March 25 - Body of Miss Sund, 15, discovered near Lake Don Pedro.

April 7 - A grand jury in Fresno begins hearing circumstantial evidence against a group of ex-convicts in the sightseers' deaths.

July 22 - Naturalist Joie Armstrong, 26, is found decapitated near her remote cabin. The FBI says there is no connection to the Sund-Pelosso slayings and maintains that key suspects in that case are behind bars on unrelated charges.

July 23 - Cary Stayner, questioned earlier in the case, fails to show up for work at the Cedar Lodge. The FBI begins a search.

July 24 - Stayner is arrested at a nudist colony and taken to the FBI's Sacramento headquarters, where he confesses to all four murders.

July 25 - The FBI charges Stayner with the murder of Ms. Armstrong but only names him as a suspect in Sund-Pelosso slayings. Federal sources say they want to eliminate the possibility of accomplices before bringing more charges.

July 26 - Stayner tells a television reporter in a jailhouse interview that he alone killed all four women and expects to plead guilty.

Aug. 6 - Stayner pleads innocent in federal court to Ms. Armstrong's murder.

Sept. 22 - Stayner pleads innocent to additional charges of trying to sexually assault and kidnap Ms. Armstrong.

Oct. 20 - The Mariposa County district attorney charges stayner with capital murder in the slayings of the Sunds and Miss Pelosso.