Almost fifty years ago, three young girls hitchhiked from downtown Indianapolis to the eastern part of the city trying to get to an amusement park. Unfortunately, they never reached their final destination that evening. A man in his early 40s pulled over on the side of the road and picked them up. They quickly realized they were in danger when one of the girls noticed that the inside front passenger door handle was missing. The girls were driven to a cornfield in a secluded area of town. The youngest victim was sexually assaulted and stabbed in the throat and chest over ten times. The other two victims had their throats slashed and all three were left for dead.
Miraculously, all three victims survived this horrible ordeal. Somehow the two older victims were able to flag down a good Samaritan who was driving by and get help. For years, detectives worked on this case to try and identify the perpetrator. Evidence from the scene was tested and a DNA profile foreign to the victims was obtained. The DNA profile was uploaded to the Combined DNA Index System (CODIS), but no hits were obtained. In early 2023, the Indianapolis Metro Police Department reached out to DNA Labs International to pursue forensic investigative genetic genealogy testing options. The extract that had previously yielded the foreign DNA profile was submitted and testing was initiated. A single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) profile was generated using the ForenSeq Kintelligence kit and the profile was uploaded to the GEDmatch Pro and Family Tree DNA databases. This led to a huge break in the case – after building out trees for nineteen significant genetic associations, two potential close relatives of the unknown profile were identified. Luckily, both individuals were very cooperative with the investigation and provided samples which were used to confirm the identity of the unknown profile using short tandem repeat (STR) testing.
Finally, after nearly fifty years of waiting, these three women had an answer. This presentation will review the details of this case, the technology used that was able to solve this case from half a century ago, and how this technology can be used in other cold cases and current casework.
Almost fifty years ago, three young girls hitchhiked from downtown Indianapolis to the eastern part of the city trying to get to an amusement park. Unfortunately, they never reached their final destination that evening. A man in his early 40s pulled over on the side of the road and picked them up. They quickly realized they were in danger when one of the girls noticed that the inside front passenger door handle was missing. The girls were driven to a cornfield in a secluded area of town. The youngest victim was sexually assaulted and stabbed in the throat and chest over ten times. The other two victims had their throats slashed and all three were left for dead.
Miraculously, all three victims survived this horrible ordeal. Somehow the two older victims were able to flag down a good Samaritan who was driving by and get help. For years, detectives worked on this case to try and identify the perpetrator. Evidence from the scene was tested and a DNA profile foreign to the victims was obtained. The DNA profile was uploaded to the Combined DNA Index System (CODIS), but no hits were obtained. In early 2023, the Indianapolis Metro Police Department reached out to DNA Labs International to pursue forensic investigative genetic genealogy testing options. The extract that had previously yielded the foreign DNA profile was submitted and testing was initiated. A single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) profile was generated using the ForenSeq Kintelligence kit and the profile was uploaded to the GEDmatch Pro and Family Tree DNA databases. This led to a huge break in the case – after building out trees for nineteen significant genetic associations, two potential close relatives of the unknown profile were identified. Luckily, both individuals were very cooperative with the investigation and provided samples which were used to confirm the identity of the unknown profile using short tandem repeat (STR) testing.
Finally, after nearly fifty years of waiting, these three women had an answer. This presentation will review the details of this case, the technology used that was able to solve this case from half a century ago, and how this technology can be used in other cold cases and current casework.
Workshop currently at capacity. A waitlist is available to join on our registration page.
Chief Operating Officer and Technical Leader, DNA Labs International
Cristina Servidio is the Chief Operating Officer and Technical Leader at DNA Labs International, where she manages laboratory operations and oversees the analysis of forensic DNA evidence.
