Nickey Duane Stane, 58, formerly of Visalia, pleaded guilty Thursday, May 15, 2025, to the 1996 murder of Fresno State student Debbie Dorian and a series of sexual assaults in Visalia from 1999 to 2002. He faces life in prison without parole. (GV Wire Composite)
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A former Visalia man pleaded guilty Thursday to the 1996 murder of Fresno State student Debbie Dorian and the sexual assaults of multiple women in Visalia between 1999 and 2002, prosecutors said.
Nickey Duane Stane, 58, entered the plea in Fresno County on Tuesday, nearly three decades after Dorian was found dead and more than 20 years after a string of violent assaults in the Central Valley, the Tulare County District Attorney’s Office said in a statement.
The case remained unsolved for years until prosecutors in Tulare County filed a “John Doe” complaint in 2009 using a DNA profile linked to the Visalia assaults. In late 2019, new DNA technology led authorities to identify Stane as the suspect in both the homicide and assaults.
The cases were consolidated in January 2020 to be tried in Fresno County.
Stane faces life in prison without the possibility of parole when he is sentenced on June 12.
