Newsroom
The tiny tombstone of David Paul reads “beloved little man.” David, an infant who froze to death hours after being born, was found abandoned underneath a tree in a Connecticut parking lot on a frigid winter morning in January 1988.
The newborn was swaddled in blankets, resting at the base of a tree that was hidden from the road. By the time police found him on Jan. 2, 1988, he had died of exposure to the frigid weather.
The mother, who lives in Connecticut, said she was 25 and “in a very bad state of mind at the time,” police said. DNA helped police solve a 32-year-old cold case and track down the mother of a newborn boy who was found dead in a Connecticut parking lot in January 1988.
On Jan. 2 as a small group of Meriden police officers arrived at the Walnut Grove Cemetery to mark the 32nd anniversary of the discovery of a dead baby boy left bundled in a pink blanket, two other detectives were about to confront his mother. Using the latest in genetic DNA technology and working with a private California-based company that specializes in identifying the unidentified, police knew that Karen Kuzmak Roche had abandoned the little baby local clergy named David Paul or “God’s little man.”
Thirteen years ago, a young woman was found dead in small-town Texas. She was nicknamed “Lavender Doe” for the purple shirt she was wearing. Her real identity would remain a mystery until amateur genealogists took up her case.
A lifelong love of science and fascination with family roots have served Colleen Fitzpatrick well as she works to unlock the mysteries of criminal cold cases. Colleen Fitzpatrick ’76 grew up surrounded by living history.
DNA found on two cigarette butts was the evidence King County sheriff’s detectives said they needed to make an arrest in the homicide of Sarah Yarborough, a 16-year-old drill-team member who was found strangled on the campus of Federal Way High School nearly three decades ago. Patrick Leon Nicholas was charged Thursday with first-degree murder with sexual motivation, according to King County prosecutors.
Episode 10 – “Sheeps Flat Murder Mystery” The episode follows Washoe County P.D.’s exhaustive investigation to identify both a victim and her killer.
Episode 1 – “Deadly Desire” 30-year old Jodine Serrin was murdered in her own bed. Explore Southern California police’s extensive efforts to solve the mystery, and how advances in genetic genealogy finally cracked the case.
Officially, she is known as Jane Seneca Doe. When her body was found on a roadside in rural Grundy County in October of 1976, she carried no identification but was believed to have been between 18 to 23 years old.