Image: University of Puget Sound Yearbook, 1960.

[June 2023] “Nogales John Doe 2002” has been successfully identified as Donald Hadland, Jr.

Hadland’s remains were found in a hotel room in Nogales, Arizona in 2002, where he had registered for a room under a false identity just prior to his death. Although a fingerprint match was found revealing a possible identity as Hadland, questions regarding his identity remained unanswered due to conflicting identifying information. The Pima County Office of the Medical Examiner (PCOME) called him “Nogales John Doe” and his remains were interred in 2003 in Nogales.

This case is the first announced successful identification for the IGG Center at Ramapo College of New Jersey. “The teamwork and diligence of our IGG students’ work on this case is a great and consequential example of how the IGG Center at Ramapo College, the first of its kind nationally, contributes meaningfully to our society,” said Ramapo College President Cindy Jebb. “The hands-on learning, research, and investigative casework taking place at the Center helps our law enforcement partners locally and across the nation, as well as those in our communities who long for closure on the loss of loved ones.”

Read more about his identification here.

Image courtesy of the Pierce Family

[October 2023] “Saint Louis John Doe 2012” has been successfully identified as Joseph Daniel Pierce.

Joseph Pierce was 23 years old when his remains were found in 2012. The St. Louis City Medical Examiner’s Office attempted to identify him with traditional means but his name remained a mystery.

Pierce, from Texas, was loved and missed by his family without any idea about his whereabouts or whether he was alive or dead for more than a decade. St. Louis City MEO Executive Director of Operations Tara Rick could not give up on this case and shared, “Over the past eleven years, the family and what they must be going through never left my mind. I’m honored to have been part of the team able to restore Joseph’s name. I am thankful to the RCNJ IGG Center for their partnership and collaboration with Intermountain Forensics to resolve this case.”

Pierce’s mother also hopes sharing this story encourages others to upload DNA to databases to help solve cases like her son’s. “The genetic genealogy in this case was straightforward due to the presence of one of John Doe’s relatives in the GEDmatch database. Thanks to that family member, we were able to quickly provide an investigative lead and ultimately restore Mr. Pierce’s name,” said Binder.

More details about this identification are available here.

Image: Gordon Technical High School Yearbook, Chicago, IL, 1966

[December 15, 2023] “Rhinelander John Doe 1980” has been successfully identified as Norman “Norm” Grasser of Chicago, IL

On March 19, 1980, the Oneida County Medical Examiner’s Office along with the Oneida County Sheriff’s Office responded to a call about a body found in the snow in a field in the Town of Pine Lake, WI approximately 46 yards off of Highway 17. No identification was found on the body. A forensic autopsy performed at the University of Wisconsin determined that the male died from cold exposure due to hypothermia. Fingerprints sent to the Wisconsin State Crime Laboratory and Federal Bureau of Investigation did not confirm an identity. The case continued to be investigated through missing persons reports and press releases through the years.

In January 2023, the Ramapo College IGG Center was enlisted by the Oneida County Sheriff’s Office in Rhinelander, WI to assist with identifying “Rhinelander John Doe.”

In May, students in the Ramapo College IGG Certificate Program investigated genetic matches of “Rhinelander John Doe” and identified Norman Grasser as a candidate. Mr.Grasser’s brother had been searching for him for over 40 years and even created a FindAGrave page noting that the date of Mr. Grasser’s death was the day he was reported missing, January 20, 1980, in Chicago, IL.

Read more about his identification here.

Image courtesy of the Jacobsen Family

[January 31, 2024] “Beaver Creek John Doe” has been successfully identified as David Emil Jacobsen.

In 2011, the deceased body of a male subject was discovered near a hiking area in Beaver Creek, Yavapai County, Arizona. This decedent had no wallet or identification on his person to aid with his identification, which hampered the Yavapai County Sheriff’s Office investigation. More than 12 years passed while hoping for a match through NamUs or the Cogent Automated Fingerprint Identification System, which both yielded unsuccessful results to help identify Beaver Creek John Doe.

Students in the Ramapo College Investigative Genetic Genealogy Certificate Program discovered the most likely candidate to be David Emil Jacobsen. The discovery of a candidate was brought about by the combination of family tree research and the presence of unique circumstantial details observed by the students.

More details about this identification are available here.

The Palmyra Spectator, Palmyra, Missouri – Wednesday, December 20, 1944

[April 16, 2024] “Rock Collection John Doe” has been successfully identified as Captain Everett Leland Yager.

In 2002, a human jaw bone containing several teeth was submitted to the Yavapai County Sheriff’s Office in Northern Arizona. The bone, collected by a child as he added to his rock collection, had likely been picked up in the county – but the boy’s parents were not sure exactly where or when. Traditional DNA testing was performed, but there was no match in government databases to “Rock Collection John Doe”.

More than 20 years later, students in the IGG Bootcamp at Ramapo College Investigative Genetic Genealogy Center used IGG to identify Captain Everett Leland Yager as a likely candidate for Rock Collection John Doe in Summer of 2023. A reference sample was collected from Captain Yager’s daughter, and he was positively identified in March of 2024.

Captain Yager had perished as the result of a tragic airplane accident during a military training exercise in 1951. Although his remains were thought to have been recovered at the scene of the accident in California, Captain Yager’s jawbone somehow ended up in a child’s rock collection 50 years later. This part of the story remains a mystery, but you can read more about his identification here.