Detectives hope to solve Ohio cold case through latest DNA technology

GAMBIER, Ohio (WCMH) – The Knox County Sheriff’s Office is hoping to crack a 15-year-old cold case homicide through the use of a relatively new technology that predicts the face of a suspect using DNA. 

Detectives have requested the assistance of Parabon Nanolabs, a Virginia-based private company that provides DNA services to law enforcement, in the homicide of Jean Davis, 54. 

On Sunday, Dec. 20, 2009, at about 10:54 a.m., the sheriff’s office received a call that Davis was found unresponsive in the backyard of her residence, located on the 24000 block of Dennis Church Road. She was discovered by friends from her church, according to Detective Kenneth Urand.

Once deputies arrived, they determined Davis suffered a gunshot wound to her head and was dead. Law enforcement also learned that her tan truck, a 2002 Chevy Avalanche Z71, was missing. The next day, her vehicle was found about 20 miles away. 

“Her tan-colored Chevy Avalanche was located in Newark, and they were able to gather some evidence out of that,” Urand said.

DNA found in the truck was tested by the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation’s lab, and came back as an unknown male, according to Urand. Typically, when a lab determines DNA is unknown, it means the DNA was searched against a national database called CODIS – which contains DNA collected from crime scenes, convicted felons and felony arrestees across the country – and did not match anyone. 

Since 2009, the sheriff’s office maintains it has continued to pursue leads and respond to tips in an effort to solve the case. Urand said Knox County detectives were contacted by the BCI in March, with the state agency expressing they wanted to retest the sample with modern technology to see if a match could be made. 

“As far as that, that profile or that analysis, I was told that there wasn't anything found,” Urand said. 

After the BCI testing did not yield a suspect, Urand said the county's sheriff told him in November that other law enforcement agencies in the state have had success solving cold cases through Parabon Nanolabs.

The sheriff's office then requested a DNA phenotyping service through the company that would produce a computerized image of the potential suspect, generated using the DNA recovered from Davis’ car. The company, which has offered this service since 2015 and was the first to do so, asserts it can accurately predict a person’s eye color, hair color, skin color, freckling and face shape from DNA. 

“In this small community that we have, if this builds a profile of this person of interest, and then you know we put that out there in the news, somebody is very clearly going to recognize [the person],” Urand said. 

Parabon Nanolabs claims DNA phenotyping can be used to generate leads in cases where no match has been found in databases such as CODIS. The price of the service is customized based on a variety of factors, with The New York Times reporting in 2017 that police departments usually end up paying $4,000 to $5,000 per case.

The company admits that DNA phenotyping does have its limits, since some traits are partially determined by environmental factors and personal choices, rather than DNA alone. Factors that cannot be predicted include facial hair, tattoos, age, weight, scars and hairstyle.

The phenotyping service, which has a turnaround time of about 45 days once the lab receives the sample, does provide corresponding “measures of confidence” on each trait. For example, traits such as eye color are not greatly affected by outside factors and are predicted with higher accuracy. 

Some groups such as the Electronic Frontier Foundation and American Civil Liberties Union have come out against the service. The groups cite concerns that the computer-generated images may increase the risk of false arrests and could actually harm an investigation if the perpetrator does not look like the image.

Parabon Nanolabs also offers services such as genetic genealogy, which uses DNA and databases such as Ancestry.com to solve crimes by tracing a suspect’s familial relationships, and facial reconstructions of unidentified skulls.

Urland is awaiting a response from the company regarding the request. He asked anyone with information on Davis’ homicide to contact the Ohio BCI at 330-659-4607, or the Knox County Sheriff's Office at 740-399-3959.