In California, late in the summer of 1987, a young woman would be found dead on the side of a highway and remain unidentified until early 2019, when she finally had her name restored.
It was August 30th, and a hiker came across the nude and mostly skeletal remains of a woman, lying fifty feet off the side of Santa Ana Canyon Road near the 91 Freeway in Anaheim. It was not immediately clear how she had been killed, though later examination would determine that she had been stabbed in the chest. Time of death was estimated to have been approximately two months prior to the discovery of her body.
No clothing or identification was found alongside the remains; in fact, the only clues as to the victim’s identity were a length of cord, a red handkerchief, and a few locks of light brown hair. The woman was thought to be between fifteen and nineteen years old, with a slender build, and standing somewhere between five-foot-one and five-foot-four. She also had six missing teeth, and a chip in one of her remaining front teeth. Her killer had removed her hands, perhaps to impede identification.
Police scoured missing persons reports, but came up with no promising matches, and for many years, the victim was known only as Anaheim Jane Doe. Authorities periodically attempted to run her DNA and dental records through the system, but had no luck until late 2018, when, working alongside the non-profit DNA Doe Project, they had a breakthrough: Jane Doe’s DNA was found to be a close match to an individual who had submitted their profile to the genealogy website GedMatch. Incidentally, this was the same manner in which notorious Golden State Killer Joseph DeAngelo was finally identified.
It turned out that the stabbing victim was twenty-year-old Tracey Hobson, who had gone missing from her Anaheim home in June of 1987 and had been murdered shortly afterward. Though her family were relieved to be able to lay their daughter to rest at last, her killer remains unknown, and the case is still open.
Crime Immemorial 