More than two decades ago, an Arizona man traveled to Ariz. to report a unique and disturbing discovery. When he called sheriff’s deputies in Yavapai County: While going through his childhood rock collection, he found a human jawbone that was mistaken for a stone. .
The county coroner’s office tried for years to find the owner of the faulty jawbone fragment, but DNA databases found no match. And then, earlier this week, one finally emerged when the Center for Investigative Genetic Genealogy at Ramapo College in New Jersey announced that it had confirmed a genetic match.
The bone belonged to the late US Marine Corps Captain Everett Leland Yager. There was no mystery surrounding Yager’s death; The Orange County Register, then called the Santa Ana Register, reported that the 30-year-old Missourian crashed and died during flight training near El Toro Marine Air Station in Orange County in 1951.
What was surprising was that part of Yager’s jaw was not buried with his other remains.
“We have absolutely no idea how [the jawbone] “It ended up in the kid’s collection,” said Paul Wick, Yavapai County Sheriff’s Department public information officer. “All the circumstances surrounding it [makes this case] matchless.”
In a press release from Ramapo College, the research team hypothesized that a scavenger may have taken part of his body and carried it across state lines, from Southern California to Arizona.
This unsolved case is one of two the Yavapai County Sheriff’s Department was able to close thanks to the free services of the forensic genealogy laboratory at Ramapo College, which began a partnership with Yavapai County a year ago.
“It was a really exciting moment,” said Cairenn Binder, deputy director of the Center for Investigative Genetic Genealogy. Yager died July 31, 1951, according to Yavapai County officials, and now a discovery was bringing his story to life 73 years later. “People were yelling across the room and running to each other’s computers to show each other their findings,” Binder said. said.
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Six students who attended an intensive workshop at the center last summer found a clue that the bone belonged to Yager. One of the helpers, Ethan Schwartz, was a high school sophomore intern. According to Ramapo College, he is now one of the youngest people to help solve a forensic genetics case.
After receiving a tip from the Ramapo team, the Yavapai County Sheriff’s Department collected DNA samples from Yager’s daughter, which allowed Bode Technology in Lorton, Virginia, to confirm the bone fragment.
Yager’s family declined to speak to the media, but Yavapai officials said the family was grateful that part of his body was finally reunited with his remains, 70 years after he was buried in his hometown of Palmyra, Mo.
Schwartz, a sophomore at Suffern High School in nearby Rockland County, N.Y., said he was grateful to be able to contribute to a case that felt personal to his own family history.
“I have a deep connection with our armed forces,” Schwartz said, explaining that his grandfather served in the Air Force and his great-uncle was a submarine commander in the Navy.
Since most of the DNA samples on file are from people of Western European heritage, he will return to Ramapo College this summer to continue his research on how ethnicity plays a role in the search for a genetic match.
“Even if I don’t have a college major, I will definitely have a passion for it,” he said. “I’m really grateful for the experience I had over the summer because I definitely want to continue it in the future.”
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Although this multi-state saga is over, we can expect to see more cases like this solved in the future, said David Gurney, director of the Center for Investigative Genetic Genealogy.
In the past, law enforcement had to rely solely on the FBI-administered Unified DNA Index System, which brings together the genetic profiles of family members of missing people and people who have committed crimes. But Gurney said forensic laboratories now have access to a broad swath of genetic information through commercial genealogy databases such as Family Tree DNA and GEDmatch.
These databases are populated by people who order DNA tests for their own benefit, said Gurney, an assistant professor of law and society at Ramapo College. With millions of profiles to examine, investigators can often find distant relatives of the person they are trying to locate or identify.
“This is the most revolutionary way to conduct research since the advent of DNA, because any DNA sample can now be detected given enough work and enough time,” said Gurney, who founded the genealogy center with Binder in 2022.
The success of the centre’s accelerated DNA matching course has doubled enrollment this year, filling 15 seats in the class and creating a growing waiting list. You don’t necessarily need to have a degree in history or genetics to become a forensic genealogist.
But Binder said there is a much more practical way for the public to help solve cold cases like Yager’s: donate your genetic information by participating in a DNA test offered by a commercial genealogy database. Binder said people need to be careful about privacy when sharing their DNA with the government, but he believes some people are willing to accept personal risk for the greater good.
“Your DNA may be the key piece that brings it home for those of us who work on these issues.” [investigative] Solving violent crime cases, solving missing persons cases,” Binder said. “Every member of the public has a chance to make an impact by doing this.”
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This story was first published in the Los Angeles Times.