The decapitated remains of a little girl found in the basement on an abandoned apartment building remain unidentified 38 years later
Her real name has eluded them for 38 years this week. But there are some updates to report.
The St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department formed a Cold Case Unit in early 2019.
This case is one of its priorities.
Investigators have ruled out about 20 children through DNA.
And they are keeping an eye on how private DNA databases are leading to big breaks in other decades-old cases.
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The technique got a lot of attention when
investigators arrested the serial killer known as the Golden State killer in 2016 – more than three decades after he raped, murdered, burglarized and terrorized dozens.
So, why can’t it help identify Baby Jane Doe?
St. Louis Maj. Shawn Dace says he gets that question a lot.
The new Cold Case Unit answers to him.
“I mean just because one case is solved doesn’t mean another one should be automatically solved,” he said. “Homicide cases are not cookie cutter cases. It takes breaks here, it takes cooperation from the community, it takes a variety of things to solve cases.”
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Right around the 30-year anniversary of the case, St. Louis police investigators wanted to exhume her body from a pauper’s grave at a cemetery in north St. Louis County to get fresh DNA samples.
The cemetery had fallen into major disrepair through the years. Trees and brush swallowed many of the graves when I visited the site in 2012 as a reporter for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.
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In 2013, a digging crew headed out to the cemetery and found Baby Jane Doe.
At the dig that day was retired St. Louis homicide detective Joe Burgoon. He’s one of the few original investigators still alive.
That exhumation led to mineral testing on her bones, which narrowed the little girl’s likely origin to about 11 states in the southeast region of the country.
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If you have information about this case, call 866-371-TIPS.
Baby Jane Doe case unsolved in St. Louis after 38 years | ksdk.com
