DNA testing puts cold cases in the spotlight. But in Houston, hundreds of the dead remain unidentified. – Houston Chronicle

They found the body, floating face down and decaying, in Buffalo Bayou. It belonged to a short and slim man with dark hair, likely in his 20s or 30s.

When authorities fished the corpse out of the water, it was dressed in khaki pants, a striped shirt, a belt with a cowboy buckle. And two combs, in his pocket.

Almost 65 years later, Harris County medical examiners still have no idea who he is. The man the oldest unnamed corpse in the countys custody is one of hundreds of people who have died in Houston and have never been identified.

More sophisticated techniques that combine DNA and genealogy are now available and are helping those who seek to put names to unidentified bodies, just as they are being used more by police across the U.S. to solve cold cases.

But every year, hundreds of unidentified bodies arrive at the Harris County Institute of Forensic Sciences, and despite best efforts, some never get named.

The morgue handles cases of unexpected or unexplained death. That includes homicides (intentional or unintentional) and cases where a person died under suspicious circumstances. It also includes people who die shortly after arriving at a hospital or after being seen by a physician, as well as suicides and children younger than 6. Finally, bodies discovered are handled by the morgue.

Harris County Institute of Forensic Sciences.

In 2021, 437 people came into the medical examiners lab as unidentified persons, according to data analyzed by the Houston Chronicle.

When investigators arrive at a crime scene or take on a new case, their first job is to try to identify the victim. They look for drivers licenses, take witness statements, and look for other clues.

Most decedents are identified within a few weeks, Institute of Forensic Sciences spokeswoman Michele Arnold said.

But many times, those efforts dont pan out. Fiery car crashes leave bodies burnt beyond recognition. Corpses abandoned or thrown into rivers decay until they are unrecognizable. Thieves take wallets, purses, phones and other items that might otherwise provide clues for detectives.

When that happens, the body is fingerprinted and run through the system, Arnold said. Forensic investigators examine dental records, skeletal radiographs, and use DNA analyses to try to identify the deceased, she said.

On its website, the center has a page with photographs of unidentified people, distinguishing marks on their bodies (such as a striking butterfly tattoo in one photo) and personal effects a slim silver watch, an Astros T-shirt, a bulky pocketknife, a shoe with blue laces and red ornamentation on the toe. Along with a warning about viewer discretion, the page says: These images are provided in hopes of identifying the deceased individuals, returning them to their loved ones, and bringing closure to families.

By the end of 2021, most of the 437 bodies that arrived at the county morgue that year were identified. Eight were not. They joined a list dating back to 1950 of more than 300 other people who remain unnamed in Harris County.

When investigators are unable to identify a corpse it is labeled long-term unidentified and the body is transferred to county burial.

In Harris County, unidentified men were found far more frequently than unidentified women.

More than a quarter of the unidentified remains at the morgue were later discovered to be in their 30s. About a fifth were in their 20s.

Among the dead found over the years was a young woman the best guess investigators can make is that she was between 20 and 35 whose body was discovered just north of 610 on Woodard in late 2020. The corpse, which appeared to have lain there for months to years, showed signs of extensive tooth decay before death.

Then there was the teen, found on Walters Road in 2012: a girl between the ages of 15 and 17. Shed been dead for three to six weeks when people finally discovered her body, lying about 20 feet from the side of Walters Road. Records from the medical examiners office show she was between 4 foot 7 inches and 5 feet 3 inches tall. Investigators noted that she appeared to be bi-racial, with long, wavy/curly dark hair held back from the face with a standard bobby pin. She had a pronounced overbite, and small dental fillings in three lower molars. When she died, she was wearing a blue and green Smurfette T-shirt, cargo pants, a black bra and pink underwear.

In 2021, seven children under the ages of 15 were brought in as unidentified bodies. Two died from injuries related to motor vehicle accidents. Three died by homicide. One investigation outlines a homeless 13-year-old boy who drowned in early August. A stillborn baby was found in a dumpster. Police still do not know the identity of the childs parents.

When someone goes missing, it leads to anguish for loved ones: worry and grief and the question of whatever happened to them.

Jo Ann Lowitzer last spoke to her daughter, Ali, 11 years ago. Ali, 16, wanted to walk to work after riding the bus home from school, Lowitzer recalled. Three people saw her ride the bus and turn down the street toward her workplace on a late April day in 2010. That was the last time anyone ever saw her, Lowitzer recalled. Because her daughter liked dark clothes and eyeliner, police at first wondered if she was a runaway, she said.

Frantic days turned into months, and then years.

At first, Lowitzer didnt want to even consider the worst.

Its even hard to think about today, she said. I would hope that shes not a Jane Doe somewhere.

As the years have passed, its become harder to ignore that possibility, she said. Like thousands of other relatives of missing people, shes submitted her genetic material to databases, hoping for some kind of closure.

If she is out there, and I found her by submitting our DNA, at least I would have that, Lowitzer said.

In past years, medical examiners have obtained grants allowing them to perform advanced genetic testing on some of the remains. Such was the case in 2011, when they exhumed about 25 bodies, including those of a young couple whose remains were discovered in north Harris County more than 40 years ago. But even those efforts can take years or longer to pan out. It wasnt until late last year, with the help of genealogy testing, that investigators identified the young couple as Harold Dean Clouse and Tina Gail Linn, who from Florida and went missing in late 1980.

Over the past decade, investigators have increasingly turned to genealogy testing to help resolve cases, said Carol Schweitzer, with the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children.

The method has helped detectives identify dozens of murder victims and killers, the most famous of whom was perhaps the Golden State Killer, a former police officer who murdered at least 13 people and raped 50 women between 1973 and 1986.

In Baltimore, authorities used the technique to identify a homicide victim from 1975, Schweitzer said.

Authorities continuously worked on that case for decades, never putting it down, yet genealogy came along and produced the tip authorities had been waiting on for 45 years, Schweitzer said.

Genealogy could also play a critical role helping track down children who went missing decades ago, she said.

A missing infant who was abducted to be raised by their abductor, or a child abducted by their non-custodial family member and taken to another country could be resolved with a lead generated by genealogy efforts, she said.

Traditionally, investigators used short tandem repeat analysis (or STR) testing to connect DNA samples with potential perpetrators. The DNA method allows scientists to analyze small strands of DNA to see if they match those of a specific person.

In 1998 the federal government created CODIS (the Combined DNA Index System), a federal database of DNA collected at crime scenes and from criminal suspects, potentially allowing investigators from all across the country to see if DNA found at crime scenes matched that of samples collected elsewhere.

It was a monumental shift in criminal investigations, said David Mittelman, CEO of Othram Inc, a DNA testing lab focused on forensic genealogy testing.

But a fundamental problem with CODIS and STR testing was that detectives could only connect it against samples already in the CODIS database.

If youre a victim, youre not in CODIS, Mittelman said. So CODIS doesnt help. It doesnt work.

Now, investigators can use more advanced DNA testing to analyze far more DNA markers and then compare those DNA samples against those added to certain genealogy databases such as Gedmatch.com.

Advancements in DNA testing have also helped bring an end to cases that have remained opened for decades.

Take the case of Mary Catherine Edwards. Murdered in 1995, the young Beaumont schoolteachers case sat, unsolved, for 25 years. Late last year, after advanced DNA testing, investigators were able to identify the genetic material of a possible perpetrator. They then used forensic genealogy testing to identify his relatives, then work down the family tree until they found the alleged perpetrator. Hes now arrested and charged with Edwards murder.

Detectives are increasingly able to solve murders like Edwards, Mittelman said.

Were able to do lots of things including use genealogy to make long range relationship determinations, Mittelman said. With that information, detectives are now increasingly able to connect once-useless DNA with relatives of crime victims or perpetrators of violence.

In Harris County, however, hundreds of corpses lie in a paupers graveyard, waiting to be named.

st.john.smith@chron.com

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DNA testing puts cold cases in the spotlight. But in Houston, hundreds of the dead remain unidentified. - Houston Chronicle