ATLANTA — A Georgia mystery that has gone on for nearly half of a century has been solved.
The Georgia Bureau of Investigation’s Cold Case Unit teamed up with a DNA lab to identify a set of skeletal remains dating back to the mid-1970s.
A leader at the lab told Channel 2 Investigative Reporter Mark Winne that this is one of at least 30 Georgia mysteries that they have helped solve.
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Kenneth Thompson’s father vanished in 1976, and for the last 50 years, he has wondered where his father, Curtis Lee Jones, was.
“Just give me something concrete, Lord, to work with,” Thompson said. "It was almost like a nightmare, a living nightmare."
But now, because of the work of Texas DNA lab Othram and the GBI, his nightmare has come to an end.
“Giving Curtis Lee Jones his name back is, I think, the feeling of doing that is somewhat indescribable," Othram Chief of Staff Colby Lasyone said.
Assistant Special Agent in Charge of the GBI’s Office of Special Investigations Justin McAllister says hunters discovered skeletal remains in Seminole County, Georgia in 1977. Now, using genealogy and DNA, those remains have been identified as Jones.
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McAllister says one of his agents came across the case while scrolling through the unidentified remains section on the GBI website.
Jones’ remains were still at the state crime lab, so the GBI sent them to Othram.
Lasyone says Othram has helped give a name to unidentified remains or a suspect in at least 30 Georgia cases, and more of them are in the works.
“We take those skeletal remain in our laboratory and we carefully extract DNA from a small portion of the skeletal remains,” he explained. “We take that DNA extract and we build up a DNA profile.”
Genealogy website data was able to narrow down distant relatives until it led to Thompson, who was able to use his DNA to identify his father.
McAllister says there is no evidence to suggest Jones died as a result of foul play.
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