Pamela Darlene Young, a petite 27-year-old woman from the Blue Ridge Mountains who relocated to Texas and fell out of touch with her family, was never reported missing after her
last known sighting in 1998.
Her remains, known only as "
Gregg County Jane Doe 2002" for more than 20 years, have finally been identified by the DNA Doe Project and the Gregg County Sheriff’s Office.
In 2013,
investigators returned to the case, sending her skull to be scanned for 3D reconstruction, and learned the victim had a cleft palate. In 2019, the sheriff’s office turned to the DNA Doe Project, an all-volunteer group that uses genetic genealogy research techniques to help identify the unidentified.
Using mitochondrial DNA samples, the DNA Doe Project traced her direct maternal line back to a family on the
border of Virginia and North Carolina, Kevin Lord, the DNA Doe Project’s director of lab and agency logistics and a team lead on the case, told Fox News Digital.
DNA Doe learned that the family had a daughter who had moved to Texas, and that daughter had a cleft palate.
Human remains known only as "Gregg County Jane Doe 2002" for the past two decades have been identified by the DNA Doe Project as belonging to Pamela Darlene Young.
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