Announcement from DNA Doe Project -- Julie Doe's getting her DNA extracted!

[moriah]

https://www.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=2116668675258573&id=2011009255824516

Here is a rundown on where we are with cases in the pipeline or currently active. We don’t officially announce a case until it’s actually in or about to enter sequencing, or needs funding prior to DNA extraction. So if they’re in the extraction stage we consider them tentative since we have no idea whether we’ll get DNA:

Sheep Flat Jane Doe (NV) – pending confirmation
Belle in the Well (OH) – genealogical analysis still in progress
Mill Creek Shed Man (WA) – genealogical analysis still in progress
Beckler River Road Doe (WA) – stalled/ insufficient/contaminated DNA
Sultan Basin Road Doe (WA) – stalled/ insufficient/contaminated DNA
Annie Doe – in sequencing
Butler Co Jane Doe (OH) – at lab for extraction
Transgender Julie Doe (FL) – at lab for extraction
Alachua Co, Florida John Doe (Sheriff # 79-2219 ME # CAPHIL 2A79/78-79) – at lab for extraction
Kings Co, CA Jane Doe (woman in tarp) – at lab for extraction
Orange Socks Jane Doe (Williamson Co, TX) – at lab for extraction
Rebel Ray John (Williamson Co, TX) – at lab for extraction
Corona Girl (Williamson Co, TX) – at lab for extraction

A few others are about to head to the lab, and many others still under discussion.

Previous cases already identified:
Joseph Newton chandler III
Buckskin Girl
Lyle Stevik

PLEASE NOTE – we’re unable to reply to all your suggestions for new cases. Please hold onto them for now. We’ll be going live on our new website very soon, where you’ll find a partial list of suggestions so far. We’re looking into an easier way for people to add to the list. Please understand we cannot work on them all 😊 But your suggestions do help us for when agencies contact us. We’ll have a little background and idea of crowd-funding potential. Thank you for your support and interest!

--------

I'm the one maintaining the FB presence for Julie Doe, after Florida's retesting of all their unidentified decedents determined she was transgender. The entire time they worked the case in 1988 they thought they were looking for a woman who had given birth at least once, because of now-discredited "pelvic notches". The more likely explanation for them is hormonal therapy, not childbirth, in this case.

It also looks like instead of crowdfunding, like I was prepared to start the ball rolling on, Lake County is sponsoring the costs for this new technology themselves. I'd had communications with the detective working this case about being willing to help organize crowdfunding if necessary to get Julie's DNA tested in this unique way, but either they or the Florida Medical Examiner's office has decided to put the $2-3k it may cost in themselves.

With it coming up on 30 years since Julie was found hidden in weeds, after someone deliberately left her with her pantyhose down to rot, she deserves her name back. Her family deserves closure and the ability to bury their child's body. After this long Julie's family may regret whatever made them lose touch -- and even if they couldn't accept a daughter then, their hearts and minds may have changed with 30 or more years of not knowing where their child is.

And sadly so many people who didn't conform to society's norms in gender and sexuality were dying during that time from other things that people who religiously read obituaries for their friends might have totally ignored an apparent cis female death, not realizing she was their friend/relative.

[BlueSpot]

1. I hope they can identify her

And, as you say, give her back her name and family.

[moriah]

2. Thanks!

Here's a writeup from Kos regarding the original story:

https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2015/11/19/1451910/--Julie-Doe-Trans-woman-likely-murdered-in-1988-believed-to-be-cis-for-27-years

On September 25, 1988, a woman's partially decomposed body was discovered hidden in tall weeds in a wooded, slightly swampy rural area of Lake County, Florida, which is east of Orlando. They were unable to determine a cause of death or examine her internal organs due to advanced decomposition, which generally progresses faster internally because of bacteria in the gut, but believed she was cisgender and that she had even given birth in the past. She was found clothed in a greenish tank top, long acid-washed “Manisha” brand denim skirt, and pantyhose which had been rolled down -- suggesting a sexual element to the crime. Her body had been dragged to the secluded location away from the road, so someone moved her after she died in an apparent attempt to conceal her body and prevent discovery. That is extremely uncommon after natural death.

She was between 22 and 35 years old, Caucasian, about 5'10 give or take an inch, 170ish lbs in life, with naturally brown hair grown long and bleached blonde. She had long, well-manicured fingernails, and an examination of her teeth showed that she had some fillings. She suffered at least one serious blunt-force traumatic injury to her face in the past, fracturing her right cheekbone, which had healed prior to her death. Other healed fractures include a rib and a toe, and possibly her nose. They noticed she had plastic surgery done on her nose, and that she had breast implants. Even with a preliminary sketch and questioning people in the area, none of the tips panned out and the case went cold.

After two unidentified women in Florida were Identified by DNA as missing women previously ruled out as being matches, Florida started re-examining all their unidentified decedent cases with fresh eyes. The new medical examiner immediately thought her skeletal dimensions indicated someone who had a hormonal balance more typical of males during skeletal growth, but once they were sure they had the right body they sent off the DNA. The results came back this month showing that she had an XY genotype, which rules out previous pregnancy.

<snip>

If anyone has information about this woman's identity, or about the circumstances surrounding her death, please contact the Lake County Sheriff's Office at 352-343-2101.

[BlueSpot]

5. Nobody deserves to die that way

I fit into the age range given in the story. I'm getting old today but I sure wasn't in 1988. My whole life was ahead of me then. It's so unfair that hers was not.

I suppose it's not likely they will find out who killed her. But I hope whoever it was has had a miserable life.

[moriah]

8. Knowing her name, or at least her birth name, will help give police a place to start.

Many UID (unidentified decedent) cases are solved when they know more about the person who was killed. For example, now that they know Marcia King's last known contact information, they're trying to reconstruct how she got there and who killed her.

But more importantly, Marcia's mother, who refused to move or change her number since police wouldn't accept a report on an adult hitchhiking in 1981, is now able to bury her daughter. It's a painful form of closure, but it's more painful I think not to know.

[LeftInTX]

3. I'm glad they're doing some genealogical analysis on some of the DNA

Many times you won't get a strong match.

[moriah]

6. Especially if the person hasn't been reported missing, which is all too likely with Julie.

So many people either rejected their children during that time, or lost touch when their children rejected the lifestyle required to live without getting beaten in BFE -- for NY, FL, or CA where they could be themselves... and then AIDS hit. My Dad was one of the lucky ones, getting his diagnosis in 1992 and managing to skate on no meds until HAART was perfected. But I'm sure many parents have wondered what happened to their child who left BFE, and still have no closure, assuming it was AIDS and they just never knew.

Julie's very bones are testimony to what gender non-conforming people still experience today, and her death is EXTREMELY suspicious. People have mentioned that at that time in Orlando, the main drag club was next to a redneck bar, shared the same parking lot. But until they know who Julie is, they don't have much to go on. Nothing came up in trying to gather touch DNA from her clothing to catch a perp, and she didn't match to any relative with a criminal record in FL (I think that type of CODIS search is limited to state databases).

So forensic genealogy, which already identified Marcia King of my state as "Buckskin Girl", is probably the only way they can ever find out who she was.

I'm an extreme advocate for this technology to be used to identify those who still remain nameless. I am concerned, however, that continued use of GEDMatch's database for criminal cases vs unidentified decedent cases will keep people from contributing their family trees and DNA to this database. I kind of wish they'd establish that the only crimes they will pursue with forensic genealogy are rape and murder. Fortunately those are also the cases most likely to yield DNA, and the kind where people are willing to cooperate even if it's a cousin who did something so atrocious.

[Takket]

4. Never heard of this until now

Best of luck in getting an ID to her any everyone on this list.

How does this work? Even if you sequence her DNA you have to compare it to another sample from her or her family to know who she is. So are there leads as to possible IDs?

[moriah]

7. The DNA Doe Project was the first to develop the "forensic genealogy" techniques...

...that have resulted in arrests for the Golden State Killer and the murderer of a child I believe out of... Ohio? Someone posted about it.

What they do is get a lab to extract DNA not to get the CODIS-tagged SNPs, but the ones used in commercial DNA tests from companies like Ancestry and 23andMe. When working with extremely degraded DNA sources, they may have to run several sequencing attempts, which Margaret Press described as like combining two or more low-resolution images to get a better total image.

But then they create a profile, incomplete though it may be, in the data format used by the commercial DNA testing companies for consumers to download their DNA, and upload it to a site called GEDMatch. This is a site where people who have taken Ancestry and 23AndMe tests have voluntarily uploaded their own DNA and family trees.

It may help the search dramatically that Julie has a Y-chromosome -- in identifying "Joseph Newton Chandler III" as Ivan Nichols, the Y-chromosome by itself can reveal a lot, and when they saw cousin matches with the Nichols surname, it helped them narrow down the right set of great-grandparents, etc.