The killer’s wily eyes peered from a yearbook picture turned portrait of evil. On the other side of the crowded room, the victim’s shy smile reflected the innocence torn from her along with her life.

In between, four surviving siblings and generations of state police investigators gathered Thursday at the Hazle Township Commons Building to reveal the identity of the monster who sexually assaulted and murdered 9-year-old Marise Ann Chiverella in 1964 and escaped justice with his own death in 1980.

Once the crowd learned that James Paul Forte was the culprit in a near 60-year-old cold case, the next question was obvious.

Who’s the shy, skinny kid with the glasses?

Seated among a phalanx of law enforcement professionals who worked the Chiverella case relentlessly for almost six decades, Eric Schubert stood out. He made the cold call that helped solve one of America’s coldest cases.

Actually, it was an email, Schubert said Friday.

“It was right when the pandemic hit and I had just gotten off my first case,” he said, explaining that he learned about the Chiverella case from a news report. “I was just looking for some way I could use genealogy to help people.

“I saw it on the news and I said, ‘I wonder if I send them a random email if they’ll let me work on this case.’ Because it’s so old, what other avenues did they have? And it worked. I didn’t think it would, but it did.”

Schubert was 18 at the time, but had been working in genealogy research since age…