Full BTK news coverage

By Roxana Hegeman

WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — Authorities were testing the DNA of a man taken into custody on minor charges, but police officials Thursday insisted there had been no arrest in the notorious BTK serial killings case.

"We have not, I repeat, we have not, made an arrest in relationship to BTK," an upset police chief Norman Williams told reporters Thursday afternoon, criticizing speculation about a possible arrest as "a travesty."

Williams' statement did not directly address the Wednesday night arrest of the man for minor trespassing and housing code violations. State police said earlier Thursday the man's DNA was being tested to see if there was any connection with the BTK serial killings that terorrized the city in the 1970s.

Authorities have pointed out that since the 1980s, police have tested hundreds of samples of blood and DNA in the case.

Wichita police spokeswoman Janet Johnson also earlier insisted no arrest has been made in the case, and that investigators have received thousands of tips. If people named in the tips have outstanding warrants, they are picked up, she said. That's what happened Wednesday night, when the man was arrested, she said.

Kansas Bureau of Investigation spokesman Kyle Smith had also cautioned that the man may not have anything to do with the case.

After the arrest, police were seen taking evidence out of his Wichita home, The Wichita Eagle reported.

The DNA report could be available before Friday, Smith said.

The man was picked up on outstanding warrants related to the maintenance of his home, including failure to paint the exterior, keeping broken cars in the yard and failing to keep the property clean, police said.

The criminal trespassing warrant was related to domestic violence, according to the jail booking log. Police declined to release any additional details.

The killer _ known by the self-coined nickname BTK, which stands for "Bind, Torture, Kill" _ is linked to eight unsolved homicides between 1974 and 1986. After years of silence, the killer surfaced in messages earlier this year.

In an appeal to the public for clues, investigators on Tuesday released a series of details that the killer mentioned in letters to Wichita media. The letters suggest the killer was born in 1939, lost his father in World War II and is a railroad buff.

The man arrested Wednesday is 64 or 65. Public records gave conflicting birth years _ 1939 and 1940.

BTK's communications indicate a lifelong fascination with trains, police said Tuesday. Among other details from the killer's letters: His father was killed in World War II, and his grandfather played the fiddle and died of lung disease. He knew a woman named Petra who had a sister named Tina. He operated a ham radio in the early 1950s, and served in the military and was discharged in 1966.

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