Identified! CA - Mendocino Co, 2 WhtFem Teens, Jul'79 *Francine Trimble & Kerry Graham*

[zelda_s]

I thought Kerry Graham went missing December 1979 and these remains were found July 1979?

 

[taramarie]

Wow! I'm assuming this means Francine was found, too, but we'll have to wait for confirmation. What a year! RIP, Kerry. <3

 

[taramarie]

I thought Kerry Graham went missing December 1979 and these remains were found July 1979?

We think the date is wrong. Francine, the friend she disappeared with, is listed on NamUs with a LKA date of December 1978. Therefore one of the dates is incorrect, and we think it was Kerry's date. Also, Carl looked in Classmates yearbooks and Francine was included in 1977 & 1978, but not 1979, meaning the LKA date of 1978 is most likely the correct year.

 

[zelda_s]

We think the date is wrong. Francine, the friend she disappeared with, is listed on NamUs with a LKA date of December 1978. Therefore one of the dates is incorrect, and we think it was Kerry's date. Also, Carl looked in Classmates yearbooks and Francine was included in 1977 & 1978, but not 1979, meaning the LKA date of 1978 is most likely the correct year.

thanks, I did think that was odd. The recon did look very much like Kerry. Glad she can go home now.

 

[carbuff]

I saw that last night on the other thread and I was like, way to go, roselvr!

 

[U2forever]

Wonderful news in such a tragic and sad situation. I'm just glad she can go home and she has her name back.
Maybe one day the monster who did this will pay, and pay dearly.

 

[Springrain]

Wonderful news in such a tragic and sad situation. I'm just glad she can go home and she has her name back.
Maybe one day the monster who did this will pay, and pay dearly.

Justice must be served!

RIP Kerry Graham.

And I'm sure the other Doe is Francine. But we will have to await confirmation.

 

[Jake479]

RIP Kerry Ann Graham

 

[Jake479]

Was Kerry the first Jane Doe or was she the one we originally thought was male?

 

[nola]

Does anyone know if Francine's DNA was submitted to CODIS? My LE contact is in NV, not CA. So this match of Kerry came as a result of NV running Kerry's mitochondrial DNA (I think from mom and sister) thru CODIS as a potential for their Jane Doe. If anyone has a connection at Mendocino County, they might be willing to share Francine's DNA status. It would make logical sense that these two teens who left together would be found together.
God Bless their families and grant them peace.
c:

 

[cvaldez1975]

the one they thought was male.

they were so close to home!!! im betting they really didn't run away, they prob were hitch hiking and got the wrong ride.

I haven't seen rose lvr around, and it says time out on her thing. maybe someone should hit her up and let her know?

Was Kerry the first Jane Doe or was she the one we originally thought was male?

 

[cvaldez1975]

also, Forestville is a bit west of santa rosa and Sonoma and en route to the beach. they could have been hitching to the beach or something.

 

[taramarie]

the one they thought was male.

they were so close to home!!! im betting they really didn't run away, they prob were hitch hiking and got the wrong ride.

I haven't seen rose lvr around, and it says time out on her thing. maybe someone should hit her up and let her know?

Roselvr is one of the admins of the FB page "Never Forget Me" & this story was posted last night, so I think she already knows

 

[nola]

100% correct on this case Websleuthers!!
Detective Azeez (Sonoma County Sheriff's office/Missing Persons) was able to confirm that both girls (Francine & Kerry) did match the two previously unidentifed remains from Mendocino County. They are tying up loose ends, but appreciate y'alls submission. Nice job!

So impressed that despite the gender and last seen date error that you people zeroed in on this and got it right :great:

 

[AliceInPain]

Oh wow... you do such great things here...

WHY was this not solved earlier, and why was one of them supposedly a guy??
Things I will never understand.

RIP kids, justice will come!

Rest in peace Kerry & Francine ... :heartbeat:

 

[carbuff]

Oh wow... you do such great things here...

WHY was this not solved earlier, and why was one of them supposedly a guy??
Things I will never understand.

RIP kids, justice will come!

Rest in peace Kerry & Francine ... :heartbeat:

Before DNA, ME's had to estimate gender from physical characteristics of the remains, and children before sexual maturity do not show a lot of differentiation.

Also, before medical examiners were common, many areas had a coroner who might not have had any forensics training or other qualifications.

It's not surprising mistakes are made It's probably surprising there aren't more. :sigh:

 

[nola]

Good article about determining gender from physical examination of skeleton remains -- which is what initially was done in this case.

http://www.exploreforensics.co.uk/determining-sex.html


"The determination of sex in skeletons is only possible once the male or female has reached adolescence or adulthood. Sexual dimorphism is slight in pre-adolescent children so this is a difficult task to perform if the skeleton is that of what might be a child."


Article about the information that women and men can derive from their mitochondrial DNA:

https://www.igenea.com/en/mitochondrial-dna

"The mtDNA test shows not only the origin of your maternal ancestors, but also with whom you are related in the maternal line."


Third article about DNA, that includes information about nuclear dna and how nDNA is used to test for gender.

http://www.sfu.museum/forensics/eng/pg_media-media_pg/adn-dna/

"Sex identification is an important part of generating a DNA profile. To determine sex from nDNA, analysts use the fact that females have two X chromosomes and males have one X and one Y chromosome to target genes that differ between males and females."

 

[CarlK90245]

Does anyone know if Francine's DNA was submitted to CODIS? My LE contact is in NV, not CA. So this match of Kerry came as a result of NV running Kerry's mitochondrial DNA (I think from mom and sister) thru CODIS as a potential for their Jane Doe. If anyone has a connection at Mendocino County, they might be willing to share Francine's DNA status. It would make logical sense that these two teens who left together would be found together.
God Bless their families and grant them peace.
c:

This was not a CODIS hit. It was a NCIC hit on dentals. Earlier this year, the detective in charge of Kerry's case looked in the casefile and realized that the Date of Last contact was a year off. It had her DLC as December 79, when in fact she was LKA in December 78.

When he changed the DLC in NCIC, the system immediately kicked out a hit on dentals.

One major weakness in the NCIC system is it will not generate a dental hit if the DLC is later than the Date of Discovery. So if there is a DLC error, as there was here, the NCIC system will not run a dental comparison.


________

Edit to add correction: The hit wasn't on dentals, it was just a hit based on general similarities. The dentals were never entered in the system until after they got the hit. But the match was confirmed using dentals.

My point about inconsistent dates precluding a dental match is correct though. If the DLC precedes the date of discovery, NCIC will not compare the dental charts.

 

[Jake479]

RIP Kerry Ann Graham

RIP Francine Marie Trimble

 

[Still_Seek_Answers]

Yes, Roselvr did a wonderful job and I am very happy for her. We did release it on Never Forget Me as a tentative ID only because we like to make sure LE is ready for the information to be released before we post it as a confirmed ID. Since we do allow people to link to threads here on WS that go with the cases we post I am sure many of our readers have come over here to read their thread and catch up on things they did not know.

Great Job Roselvr!!