Investigators used DNA evidence to identify the remains of a Winston-Salem man who was reported missing nearly 34 years ago, authorities said Monday.
On July 24, 1986, Dwight Michael Gordon’s family reported him missing to the Winston-Salem Police Department, police said in a statement. Gordon was 37 and had been living on Washington Avenue.
Category Archives: Cold Cases
He went missing decades ago. DNA helped police ID the body of Dwight Michael Gordon last month.
Investigators use DNA, genetic genealogy to ID another victim of Long Island serial murders
LONG ISLAND, N.Y. — Police on Long Island have added another link in a chain of 11 unsolved Gilgo Beach killings believed to be the work of a serial killer.
Using genetic genealogy, Suffolk County police investigators have identified one of the slain women, initially dubbed “Jane Doe No. 6,” as Valerie Mack, police officials said Thursday. Mack’s identification comes 20 years after she vanished.
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Posted in Cold Cases
Boulder County Sheriff’s Office solves 1970 rape and murder case
The Boulder County Sheriff’s Office said DNA evidence has identified a man who died in 2019 as the person who likely raped and murdered a 23-year-old Denver woman in 1970.
According to a release, Betty Lee Jones was found dead on March 9, 1970, by two Colorado Department of Transportation workers down an embankment on Colo. 128 near the Boulder and Jefferson county border.
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Posted in Ancestry, Cold Cases, Familial, Forensic Industry News
New DNA evidence in 20-year-old murder
New DNA results in a 20-year-old cold case in Kihei puts the defendant at the scene of the alleged murder, police said Thursday.
The Maui Police Criminal Investigation Division was informed this month that DNA recovered from blood samples found at the crime scene belong to defendant Anthony Moreno, who was charged with second-degree murder in an indictment returned in November by a Maui County grand jury.
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Posted in Cold Cases, Forensic Industry News
Scots forensics expert says defence lawyers should be able to see secret police DNA files
Scotland is the only country in the civilised world where lawyers are denied access to this key evidence.
A crushed water bottle just helped solve a $3 million Tampa jewelry heist
A crushed water bottle in a Tampa jewelry store and a burglary tool left in a Los Angeles home helped connect a $3 million bay area burglary to a similar crime in a Los Angeles property owned by actors Goldie Hawn and Kurt Russell, according to law enforcement officials.
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Posted in Cold Cases
How a man convicted of his high school girlfriend’s killing was freed by decades-old DNA evidence
Before Leah Freeman’s body was found outside of her hometown of Coquille, Oregon, in 2000, her gym shoes, one of them bloody, were virtually the only physical clues police had to figure out what had happened to the missing 15-year-old.
Nearly 20 years later, one of those same shoes has played a key role in freeing from prison the only person who has ever been convicted of killing her: Freeman’s high school boyfriend Nick McGuffin.
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Posted in Cold Cases
Forensic genealogy group helps Cumberland County investigators crack 21-year-old cold case
RALEIGH, N.C. (WTVD) — A popular genealogy website helped crack a cold case murder of a baby from 21 years ago.
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Posted in Ancestry, Cold Cases, Database
DNA match leads to arrest in 2004 sexual assault
“After 16 years, you either think your suspect is deceased or they’re already serving a prison term where it wasn’t required to collect their DNA,” said Mountain View Police Capt. Jessica Nowaski in an interview Friday. “I’m just really excited that we were able to bring closure to our victim.”
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Posted in Cold Cases, Database, Forensic Industry News
New bill would allow more DNA testing in old cases
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (CNS) — Advances in DNA testing now make it possible to identify perpetrators that would have gone undetected a decade or two ago, but people convicted of a crime have been blocked from having crime scene DNA except in the most unusual circumstances.
However, new legislation could lead to more being exonerations and convictions.
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Posted in Cold Cases, DNA Legislation, Forensic Industry News
New London’s mystery bones to be tested again
NEW LONDON — The New London Police Department and Porchlight Project will work together in an attempt to discover the name of the young woman whose bones were found in an old garage in 2016.
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Posted in Cold Cases
Georgia Uses DNA Sample and Genealogy to Solve 1999 Rapes
MARIETTA, Ga. — Advanced genetic genealogy testing helped authorities solve three Georgia rape cases from 1999, a prosecutor said Tuesday.
The three rapes happened between June and October 1999 within a three-mile radius of each other, Cobb County District Attorney Joyette Holmes said in a press release. In each case, a woman awoke in the wee hours of the morning in her own bed to find an unknown man standing over her.
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Posted in Ancestry, Cold Cases, Database
Las Vegas man arrested after DNA links him to 2015 rape
A Las Vegas man was arrested Thursday after his fingerprints linked him to a sexual assault from 2015.
Around 3:40 a.m. June 27, 2015, a 20-year-old woman called police and reported that a man had broken into her apartment and raped her, according to a recently released arrest report. Years later, the man was identified as Safari Summit, now 26.
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Posted in Cold Cases
Betty Pat Gatliff, forensic sculptor who put a face to John Does, dies at 89
The bones usually arrived by mail, a stream of anonymous packages bearing unknown remains. Sent from police departments, coroners and medical examiners across the country, they landed on the Oklahoma doorstep of Betty Pat Gatliff, a forensic sculptor who pioneered a new method for reconstructing faces, turning an avocation into her life’s work.
New DNA evidence links John Doe case to small American Indian tribe
The Kenosha County medical examiner is hopeful that new DNA evidence will help solve a 26-year-old mystery.
Medical Examiner Patrice Hall said new DNA testing shows an unidentified John Doe found in Pleasant Prairie in 1993 may have ties to a small American Indian tribe in South Carolina and to people in Sonora, Mexico.
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Posted in Ancestry, Cold Cases, Missing Persons