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Category: Highlights

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City of Cape Coral, FL

The City of Cape Coral’s uses Coverdell funds to purchase a full-spectral imaging device to support evidence detection and documentation

The City of Cape Coral, Florida utilized Paul Coverdell Forensic Science Improvement Grants (Coverdell) Program funding to purchase a Crime-lite® AUTO for use in homicide investigations. The use of this full-spectral imaging device specifically assisted a neighboring law enforcement agency in detecting and documenting evidence in a homicide case that involved a stabbing. The imaging device’s infrared capabilities aided in revealing bloodstains on a suspect’s black shirt, which can be extremely difficult to detect, enabling the law enforcement agency’s technician to photograph the bloodstains and collect a sample for DNA analysis.
November 2024
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Central Ohio Regional Crime Laboratory, OH 

Ohio Regional Crime Laboratory utilizes Coverdell funding to support annual analyst training and defray the costs of consumables, standards, and instrument maintenance

The Central Ohio Regional Crime Laboratory (CORCL) operates in conjunction with the Central Ohio Drug Enforcement Task Force under the Licking County Sheriff’s Office. CORCL currently provides controlled substance and forensic analysis casework for seven counties and thirty-four law enforcement agencies located predominantly in southwest Ohio. CORCL currently operates on grant and fee-for-service funding except for personnel salary and benefits, which are covered by the Licking County Sheriff’s Office. CORCL’s Paul Coverdell Forensic Science Improvement Grants (Coverdell) Program is used to support analysts to attend annual trainings that focus on challenges in seized drug analysis and the constantly evolving testing methods and classifications of opioids. Additionally, a portion of CORCL’s Coverdell funding is set aside to defray the costs of consumables, controlled substance standards, and maintain CORCL’s two gas chromatography-mass spectrometry instruments that are used to test opioids and other controlled substances.
November 2024
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Highlights

Marion County Coroner’s Office uses BJA fellowship funding to support the training of a Forensic Pathology Fellow to increase operational capacity

The Marion County Coroner’s Office has a unique fellowship program through their partnership with Indiana University School of Medicine which significantly enhances the education, training, and experience of forensic pathologists. This partnership is being utilized to develop a pipeline of future forensic pathologists by encouraging undergraduate and medical students to consider the area of forensic pathology as they make career decisions. Marion County’s efforts are critical to addressing the national shortage of forensic pathologists by not only focusing on training fellows, but also recruiting students into the field. Furthermore, Marion County Coroner’s Office is the only county in Indiana that has an accredited forensic fellowship program. The Marion County Coroner’s Office was awarded funds through the Department of Justice’s Bureau of Justice Assistance (BJA) Strengthening the Medical Examiner-Coroner System (ME/C) Program to support the training of a forensic pathology fellow in their office. The office was awarded BJA fellowship funding at the beginning of the COVID pandemic. COVID significantly impacted the case load and the office’s ability to conduct investigations, creating a challenge for the office’s operation. During that time county death investigations increased, and the office lost several critical staff including pathologists and investigators. Internally, the office also faced a lack of funding from the county to keep up with staffing needed to adequately conduct death investigations. The BJA funded fellow performed 250 autopsies, which greatly assisted the staff forensic pathologists with the increased autopsy case load. The fellow graduated the program, became board certified, and now works in a Coroner’s Office in Ohio.
October 2024
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Highlights

Remains identified in decades-old Oklahoma cold case

On May 5, 1983, the Pottawatomie County Sheriff’s Office requested the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation investigate the suspicious disappearance of 19-year-old Melody Ann Jones who was a member of The Muscogee (Creek) Nation. That morning, Melody Ann Jones did not show up to work and a family member went by her residence to check on her. Her husband, 20-year-old Paul Richard Jones, was discovered deceased inside the home. It was determined he sustained injuries consistent with homicide. Melody Ann Jones was not located at the scene and was reported missing. Investigators searched the surrounding area on foot and horseback, covering 160 acres, while a helicopter covered 6-square miles. Investigators found no sign of Jones or any evidence. In October of 1998, skeletal remains were discovered in rural Seminole County and were transported to the Oklahoma Office of the Chief Medical Examiner (OCME). The Oklahoma OCME recently acquired the necessary resources needed for additional testing. This additional testing was conducted by the University of North Texas Health Science Center (UNTHSC) at Fort Worth through their Missing and Unidentified Human Remains (MUHR) Program grant; Purpose Area 3 (services to assist small, rural, and/or tribal entities on a national scale). UNTHSC MUHR funding was used to obtain DNA from the skeletal remains which hit to family reference samples in Combined DNA Index System (CODIS). On August 7, 2024, the remains were positively identified as Melody Ann Jones.
August 2024
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FOX 5 Atlanta

Man arrested for 1990 double murder, rape in DeKalb County

An arrest has been made in a 1990 sexual assault and double homicide case out of DeKalb County, Georgia. 55-year-old Kenneth Perry faces multiple charges in connection to the murder of siblings Pamela and John Sumpter. Nearly 34 years after the attack, a federal grant “Prosecuting Cold Cases Using DNA” helped investigators move the case forward. In February 2024, Dekalb County District Attorney’s Office worked with the Georgia Bureau of Investigation to upload the DNA profile of this case to the national database and within days, got a match to a sexual assault case in Detroit, Michigan. This match, combined with Forensic Genetic Genealogy analysis led investigators to Perry. When Perry was taken into custody, investigators collected a DNA sample which they believe will confirm that he was the perpetrator.
June 2024
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East Bay Times

Man accused in two 1979 Monterey County homicides cannot be charged due to mental illness

Jurn Norris, 69, formerly from Marina, has been identified as the perpetrator in the killings of Helga DeShon and Uicha Malgieri, both young military spouses slain in their apartments in 1979. According to the Monterey County District Attorney’s Office, they have not been able to file charges against Norris because he is incompetent to stand trial due to severe mental illness. In 2016, Marina Police Department conducted a review of unsolved homicides that had occurred in the city. Advancements in technology allowed detectives to submit evidence again and they had the opportunity to re-interview witnesses. The Monterey County District Attorney’s Office determined that sufficient evidence existed to establish Norris’s identity as the perpetrator of the murders and charges would be filed if he were mentally competent to stand trial. The Monterey County District Attorney’s Office Cold Case Task Force received a $535,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Justice back in January 2022. The grant, titled Prosecuting Cold Cases Using DNA, provides funding to support forensic testing and investigative cold cases where DNA from a suspect has been identified.
May 2024
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Highlights

Florida Man Indicted in NY’s First Use of Investigative Genetic Genealogy to Solve Cold Case Rapes

Bronx District Attorney Darcel D. Clark, Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, and New York City Police Commissioner Edward A. Caban announced that a Florida man has been charged in separate indictments for raping a woman in the Bronx and a woman in Manhattan two decades ago, after new DNA technology linked him to the brutal attacks. These are the first sexual assault cases in the state solved with Investigative Genetic Genealogy. A three-year, $500,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Justice’s Bureau of Justice Assistance to the Bronx District Attorney’s Office to solve cold cases was used to fund Investigative Genetic Genealogy. This entails taking crime scene evidence and sending it to a private laboratory to develop a profile which is used to search for consumer DNA databases for genetic relatives who consented to assist law enforcement. Using the suspect’s DNA found at the scenes, a family tree was developed by NYPD’s Forensic Laboratory, and those results helped identify the defendant as Jancys Santiago, 48.
December 2023
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Highlights

San Diego County District Attorney’s Office’s COLD funding leads to conviction of suspect in a 34-year-old cold case homicide

The San Diego County District Attorney’s Office, alongside the San Diego Police Department, convicted the killer of Larry Breen whose murder occurred on May 24, 1990. Mr. Breen was a petty officer and cook in the U.S. Navy stationed aboard the USS Fox CG-33. At the time of his death, he had been selected as the President’s chef at Camp David. Mr. Breen’s body was found at his home, slumped against a fence in the backyard. He had been stabbed several times. His car was missing and was later found abandoned over a mile from the crime scene. Despite a thorough investigation by both the Naval Criminal Investigative Service and the San Diego Police Department, the murder went unsolved. This 34-year-old cold case homicide was reviewed with funding provided by the Bureau of Justice Assistance’s Prosecuting Cold Cases Using DNA (COLD) Program and investigated using Forensic Genetic Genealogy (FGG) and the expertise of the San Diego District Attorney’s Cold Homicide and Research Genealogy Effort (CHARGE) team. A beer bottle with the suspect’s DNA was left at the crime scene. Using FGG, the CHARGE team generated an investigative lead regarding the suspect’s identity. The suspect also cut himself during the attack. Further STR DNA testing of both the bottle and blood confirmed the identity of the suspect, Brian Koehl, leading to his arrest and prosecution. Brian Koehl was sentenced to 16 years to life for the murder of Mr. Breen on November 17, 2023.
November 2023

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