Current Cold Cases Solved with Investigative DNA Genetic Genealogy

[Kurve]

Not sure how they found this person but good job.

Eighty-nine-year-old Hugo Benscher was found bound and gagged on the floor of his canal-front home in Paradise Point on June 21, 1992.
He had suffered serious head injuries.
Today, a man from Launceston in Tasmania was extradited to Brisbane where he was charged with one count of murder

Almost 28 years after Hugo Benscher was allegedly murdered, police lay charges

A man has been charged with murder 28 years after 89-year-old Hugo Benscher was found bound and gagged at his Gold Coast home.

www.abc.net.au

 

[GreyCrow]

Just bumping this as I heard something today that is interesting/concerning

In some US states if you were imprisoned before a certain date you cant be compelled to give your DNA

Hidden in prison: Thousands of inmates not in DNA databases

A significant number of unsolved mysteries could be cracked with a simple swab in a violent criminal’s cheek, experts say

www.correctionsone.com

Forensic Magazine found that seven states hold prisoners whose DNA had not been collected, and who were not in CODIS. Most often, these states had no retroactivity conditions in their DNA laws, which were generally enacted in the 1990s and were never extended into the past to include criminals already locked up. But there are other cases where prisoners refused to give samples, or authorities simply didn’t get the testing done for logistical reasons. For others, there were simply collection delays.

Over more than two months, some states refused to provide information about the status of the DNA collection efforts within their prisons. Other states started collecting the samples after they were questioned about the status of their inmate population.

But experts agree: most of the long-term inmates who aren’t in CODIS probably have other crimes on their resume. And a significant number of unsolved mysteries could be cracked with a simple swab in a violent criminal’s cheek, the experts said.

This means many serial killers in the US prison system before 1998 do not have to give a DNA swab to clear up crimes

Amazing

 

[Kurve]

Australian police want to start using Ancestry databases. ABC 7.30 tonight.

Blood ties: The controversial forensic test catching killers and rapists through relatives' DNA

Police want greater access to a controversial forensic technique that helps track down perpetrators by linking crime scene DNA to their family members.

www.abc.net.au

 

[Kurve]

Arrest made over 1998 cold case murder of Adelaide grandmother

Police have made an arrest in the case of 71-year-old Phyllis Harrison, who was fatally stabbed inside her Elizabeth South home more than 20 years ago.

www.abc.net.au

 

[Kurve]

Carla Walker was pulled out of a car in the mid 70s after her boyfriend Rodney was shot in the head through a really despicable random stranger crime. She was taken somewhere else and killed. Rodney survived but his life was really unpleasant for a long time.

They got him.

Fort Worth police make arrest in 1974 cold case murder of Carla Walker

Glen Samuel McCurley, 77, is now charged with capital murder for the death of Carla Walker in 1974.

www.fox4news.com

 

[Kurve]

There's an idea being floated to collect DNA with the understanding it would be used to solve crime and the company pays the donor for it. If there's a match that solves a crime a significant bounty is paid.

 

[BonzaRam]

What bothers me about this, especially when it to comes genealogy sites, is how is that dna sample you gave them is being stored and who exactly is in charge of that or has access to it?
For anyone to say if you have done nothing wrong then you have nothing to worry about obviously feels that places
storing dna and/or records of dna profiles are never visited by corrupt people or good people pressured into corruption. It is not the honest people you have to worry about it, it's the dishonest ones...
So you have nothing to worry about until an infinitesimal amount of your dna finds its way into a crime investigation by *cough cough* accident Sure you may eventually be able to prove what caused the contamination but imagine the bullshit you are going to go through getting to that point.

Then you have the hackers

A Security Breach Exposed More Than One Million DNA Profiles On A Major Genealogy Database

First GEDmatch, the DNA database that helped identify the Golden State Killer, was hacked. Then email addresses from its users were used in a phishing attack on another leading genealogy site.

www.buzzfeednews.com

Why a DNA data breach is much worse than a credit card leak

You can’t change your DNA

www.theverge.com

 

[Kurve]

Interesting.

How to protect your DNA data

Discover how to protect your DNA data and clue up on how genetic testing companies might use your information.

www.livescience.com

 

[sprockets]

Carla Walker was pulled out of a car in the mid 70s after her boyfriend Rodney was shot in the head through a really despicable random stranger crime. She was taken somewhere else and killed. Rodney survived but his life was really unpleasant for a long time.

They got him.

Fort Worth police make arrest in 1974 cold case murder of Carla Walker

Glen Samuel McCurley, 77, is now charged with capital murder for the death of Carla Walker in 1974.

www.fox4news.com

 

[Kurve]

This little boy was disabled, it's a very sad case.

A toddler found dead in Oregon in the 1960s went decades without a name on his grave, becoming the oldest case of unidentified human remains in the state.

The decomposed body was found by a fisherman on July 11, 1963, in the water of the Keen County Reservoir in Jackson County, the Oregon State Police said. The boy, fully dressed, was wrapped in a blanket and quilt with iron molds inside, an apparent attempt to weigh him down in the water.

A man identified as a possible brother told investigators he had a younger brother with disabilities named Stevie who lived in Oregon in the early 1960s "but mysteriously vanished from the family with little explanation," police said in a statement on Wednesday.

Authorities requested New Mexico birth records for babies with that name born in late 1960 or early 1961 whose mother could be identified using genetic genealogy, police said.

That led investigators to Steven Alexander Crawford, born Oct. 2, 1960.

He was found dead in 1963. Now this little boy finally has a name.

A toddler found dead in Oregon in the 1960s went decades without a name on his grave, becoming the oldest case of unidentified human remains in the state.

abcnews.go.com

 

[Anja_Nees]

Haven’t used these kinds of services for the reasons set out by others in this thread, although a number of the crimes have been solved because of a relative’s DNA being identified rather than the crim’s. In that sense, there would be a lot of very nervous blokes with cleanskin relatives trying to put together the family tree...

 

[chopflop]

My half sister found our family and my father using this technology. Pretty crazy stuff.

 

[Kurve]

Key points:​

• Police say Anne Pham was kidnapped, sexually assaulted and strangled
• Robert John Lanoue, who was 29 at the time, lived near her house in Seaside, California
• The 70yo has been charged with first-degree murder, kidnapping and committing a lewd act on a child

Forty years after five-year-old's death, US police charge man with murder

US detectives have used DNA evidence to charge a 70-year-old Nevada man over the killing of a five-year-old girl who disappeared while walking to kindergarten in 1982.

www.abc.net.au

 

[GreyCrow]

There is a podcast called DNA ID which looks at cold cases using the new tech.

 

[Kurve]

Here's another one, 52 years later the person believed to have murdered schoolteacher Rita Curran is identified from a discarded cigarette butt.

The identified DeRoos has passed but his wife filled in information to safely conclude that if he went to trial for murder, he'd likely be convicted.

Discarded cigarette butt, DNA tests solve 52-year-old US cold case

Detectives say DNA evidence from a discarded cigarette found near the body of a 24-year-old US school teacher in 1971 points to an upstairs neighbour being responsible for her murder.

www.abc.net.au