MI - Blissfield, Lenawee Co JD, HispMale 20-40, UP8975, "Roberto from Texas?", no head/hands, Nov'97 *arrests in 2023*

[Liv27]

Hey everyone. This is a new DNA Doe Project case. They call him Lenawee County John Doe 1997. He is currently in sequencing.

Here is his NamUs link: The National Missing and Unidentified Persons System (NamUs)

Per a witness the victim's name is possibly ROBERTO. He was married with children and had a house where he raised chickens between McAllen and Weslaco, Texas. When "Roberto" left home, he was supposed to be traveling only to Chicago and then back.

There is a drawing based on the witness's description, not the remains. There was no head found with the body so no reconstruction based off of the remains.

Presumed Homicide.

 

[Gardener1850]

Thanks for making a thread for him Liv! Here are the sketches from NAMUS:

The National Missing and Unidentified Persons System (NamUs)

 

[JovanSrna]

Oddly specific and abundant information on this one.
A name, information on family, housing with a specific location and domestic activities.
McAllen and Weslaco, Texas are some 20 minute drive apart it seems.
Distance between Weslaco, TX and McAllen, TX
The area does look like it's packed with people though.

 

[Gardener1850]

There are 4 men named Roberto that went missing before 1997:
The National Missing and Unidentified Persons System (NamUs)
The National Missing and Unidentified Persons System (NamUs)
The National Missing and Unidentified Persons System (NamUs)
The National Missing and Unidentified Persons System (NamUs)
I'm guessing they have already looked at those.. Although, maybe not, since none of these Robertos are missing from Texas. The first one above seems to fit the most-- same height and right age range but missing from California, not Texas:

Roberto Mercado Sylva
Height 5' 8" (68 Inches)
Weight 150 lbs
The National Missing and Unidentified Persons System (NamUs)

He even has a side part in his hair in the same side as the sketch....

 

[JovanSrna]

Have they been ruled out ?

 

[JovanSrna]

This decedent had no tattoos according to NamUs.
Roberto Mercado Sylva had a scar on the abdomen according to his NamUs profile.

 

[Liv27]

This decedent had no tattoos according to NamUs.
Roberto Mercado Sylva had a scar on the abdomen according to his NamUs profile.

He was a little bit decomposed. Maybe they could have missed the scar and thought it was something else?

 

[JovanSrna]

He was a little bit decomposed. Maybe they could have missed the scar and thought it was something else?

Quite possible, or perhaps missed entirely. Some scars nicely blend with the rest of the skin.
I also noticed the description of the decedent as light skinned. I wouldn't describe Mr Sylva as light skinned myself.

 

[faithx]

According to the DNA Doe Project Facebook page, his DNA has been uploaded to GEDmatch.

 

[Melt71]

First week on their results spreadsheet was in late July 2020, with a small number of low-low-level matches.

 

[Arz]

His Admixture,very mixed typical for Hispanic person

 

[doggybag2355]

I feel like I may have found a potential identity for Mr. Roberto

Mitchell Adolfo Zepedo – The Charley Project

Mitchell Zepedo was 24 years old, was last seen in September of 1997, and was travelling from Lyons, IL to Traverse City, Michigan. And he bears quite a resemblance to the witness sketch.

Lenawee County is still about 3 - 4 hours away from his trip, and where his car was found in Berwyn, Illinois, but its not completely impossible for someone to have taken his body there considering how far Marcia Batemann was found from Oklahoma City.

 

[JovanSrna]

I feel like I may have found a potential identity for Mr. Roberto

Mitchell Adolfo Zepedo – The Charley Project

Mitchell Zepedo was 24 years old, was last seen in September of 1997, and was travelling from Lyons, IL to Traverse City, Michigan. And he bears quite a resemblance to the witness sketch.

Lenawee County is still about 3 - 4 hours away from his trip, and where his car was found in Berwyn, Illinois, but its not completely impossible for someone to have taken his body there considering how far Marcia Batemann was found from Oklahoma City.

Zepedo has fair skin and we know quite a lot about him. Age and height check out. The weight is a bit off but that's one of the flexible categories anyway. The time period looks good too. I wonder how accurate those witness stories about a man from Texas are. Zepedo did use an alias, he could have used another one and switched some details around. A family in Mexico becomes a family in Texas. Mitchell becomes Roberto and so on. Maybe he had some private business he wanted to keep strictly confidential and it cost him his life. Is he on the list of exclusions?

 

[doggybag2355]

Zepedo has fair skin and we know quite a lot about him. Age and height check out. The weight is a bit off but that's one of the flexible categories anyway. The time period looks good too. I wonder how accurate those witness stories about a man from Texas are. Zepedo did use an alias, he could have used another one and switched some details around. A family in Mexico becomes a family in Texas. Mitchell becomes Roberto and so on. Maybe he had some private business he wanted to keep strictly confidential and it cost him his life. Is he on the list of exclusions?

He isn't. I recently updated the UID wiki DNA Doe Project pages with NamUs exclusions, and the only exclusions are James Cooper and Robert Villareal.

 

[JovanSrna]

He isn't. I recently updated the UID wiki DNA Doe Project pages with NamUs exclusions, and the only exclusions are James Cooper and Robert Villareal.

Will you be contacting the listed agencies?

 

[doggybag2355]

Will you be contacting the listed agencies?

Ill try to get in contact with agencies soon, I've already contacted Margaret Press with the DDP, she's usually very fast with responses.

 

[doggybag2355]

Ill try to get in contact with agencies soon, I've already contacted Margaret Press with the DDP, she's usually very fast with responses.

Got in contact with the case manager for Mitchell Zepedo, and he said I'll be hearing from him again soon.

 

[doggybag2355]

Here's Mitchell's picture for comparison:

 

[Grungster]

ADRIAN - The discovery of a body without its head or hands in a Lenawee County cornfield ignited an intensive search to identify the young man.

The body was found Nov. 19, 1997.

Now, more than four years later, Michigan State Police are reopening the unsolved homicide and are asking residents to come forward with any information they think can help.

“It's possible that people may have remembered things or there is something that they saw or heard around the time of the homicide but they didn't feel it was anything,” said Sgt. Steve Harshberger at 1st District headquarters. “Also, people hear rumors, but because they are rumors, they're afraid to come in because they can't substantiate the information.”

A local farmer preparing to harvest the crops found the decomposing body in a field off Corey Highway between Blissfield and Deerfield, about 30 miles north of Toledo, police said.

Troopers believed the body had been there more than a week.

Sergeant Harshberger said that after nearly two years of work, the trail went cold and the case was filed away as inactive. But recent information - which he would not reveal - brought the case back before investigators.

New tips have not led to the identity of the victim and did not yield suspects but does reveal that the homicide likely was drug related, the sergeant said.

The victim is described as a light-skinned male between 20 and 30 years old.

Forensic exams of the body indicate the man would have been about 5 feet, 6 inches to 5 feet, 9 inches tall and weighed 130 to 160 pounds.

Previous information led police to believe he may be a native of Toledo, Chicago, Texas, or Mexico.

Sergeant Harshberger said though it has been years since the body was found, there is always a likelihood that the killers will be found. In fact, time often is an investigator's ally, he said.

“Initially, time is in the favor of the suspect, but after a while, that turns around,” he said. “People who may have been friends with the suspects may no longer be and so want to talk or sometimes family members who might have direct knowledge of the homicide decide it's time to talk.”

Unsolved homicide brings calls for tips in Adrian

 

[Grungster]

BLISSFIELD TWP. — New, credible evidence has come to light in a homicide investigation case from 1997.

A headless, handless body was found Nov. 19, 1997, in a field west of Corey Highway, north of Carroll Highway in Blissfield Township, Michigan State Police Detective Larry Rothman of the MSP’s Monroe post said. The body was described as a light-skinned Hispanic male between 20 and 40 years old, with no scars or tattoos present. A layer of snow was covering most of the body at the time of discovery.

During the initial investigation, a witness said the victim’s name is possibly Roberto. He was married with children and had a house where he raised chickens between McAllen and Weslaco, Texas. When “Roberto” left home, he was supposed to be traveling only to Chicago and then back.

Based on recent, new information, state police recently searched the Ottawa River in Toledo and were able to gain additional evidence, Rothman said.

Anyone with information or tips about the case is asked to call Rothman at 313-407-9379.

New evidence found in 1997 homicide near Blissfield