A new DNA profile of Ted Bundy could help solve these Utah cold cases
Samantha Moilanen for The Salt Lake Tribune
Utah has a new software that could help solve a number of decades-old cold cases that investigators have lengthy suspected had been linked to notorious serial killer Ted Bundy.
For every of these cases, DNA proof largely collected within the Nineteen Seventies has sat idle for many years. Much of it was degraded or combined with DNA from a number of individuals, making it troublesome to make use of, Amy Newman, the director of the Utah Bureau of Forensic Services, advised The Salt Lake Tribune.
State testing strategies could solely produce partial DNA profiles from the samples, which then weren’t sturdy sufficient to match with the FBI’s nationwide DNA database, referred to as CODIS, she stated.
But that modified in 2023, when the state crime lab started utilizing new genotyping expertise that allowed investigators to reconstruct a full DNA profile succesful of being entered into the FBI database, Newman stated.
From there, the DNA collected in Utah was lastly in contrast to a whole DNA profile of Bundy in Florida.
The end result: Utah now has a full profile for Bundy, which can be utilized to match towards proof from different cases.
The breakthrough comes as investigators introduced final week they closed a greater than 50-year-old cold case involving the killing of Utah teen Laura Ann Aimewho was discovered lifeless in American Fork Canyon in 1974.
The DNA profile for Bundy was pieced collectively from samples collected from Aime’s physique on the time, Newman stated.
Now, it could help solve different killings lengthy believed to be tied to Bundy however by no means definitively confirmed, stated Detective Ben Pender, who leads the Salt Lake County Sheriff’s Office cold case unit.
“Maybe even cases that we’re not aware of that are Bundy cases,” Pender added. “I think it is significant.”
What cases could it help solve?
Before Bundy was executed in Florida in 1989, he confessed to killing not less than 30 younger ladies, together with eight in Utah. Some of their our bodies have by no means been discovered.
There are at present 4 identified cold cases in Utah that Bundy is claimed to be concerned in, based on the Utah Department of Public Safety’s cold case database and a division spokesperson.
It’s not clear when Bundy first started killing, however by 1974, young women were disappearing in Washington state.
Those cases had been nonetheless unfolding when he moved to Salt Lake City that September, earlier than investigators consider he went on to kill a number of ladies throughout Utah, Idaho, and Colorado.
At the time that Aime was killed, Bundy was a regulation scholar on the University of Utah.
Among the cases nonetheless beneath investigation within the killing of Nancy Wilcoxa 16-year-old cheerleader from Salt Lake County, is believed to be Bundy’s first Utah sufferer.
She went lacking in 1974, and Pender stated her physique was by no means discovered.
Pender, who continues to analyze the case, stated Bundy confessed to killing Wilcox, however investigators have by no means been in a position to independently affirm it.
Bundy advised authorities to look close to Capitol Reef National Park, however these efforts got here up empty, Pender stated.
He believes the confession could have been a ploy to delay Bundy’s execution in Florida — one cause he stated a confession alone was by no means sufficient to shut the case.
Bundy additionally confessed to killing Susan Curtisa 15-year-old who disappeared in 1975 whereas attending a youth convention at Brigham Young University in Provo, based on the state cold case database. Her physique was additionally by no means discovered.
Without bodily proof to match towards the new DNA profile, these cases cannot be resolved with the new software. But it could actually help in others.
Two extra Utah cold cases believed to be tied to Bundy embody the killing of Melissa Smithwho disappeared in October 1974 and was later discovered lifeless in Summit Park, and the killing of Deborah Smithwhose physique was discovered close to Salt Lake City International Airport in 1976, based on DPS spokesperson Stephanie Dinsmore.
Although the Bundy profile is a milestone, Newman stated the new expertise could additionally help solve different cases not linked to the serial killer.
There are 444 unsolved cases within the state, Dinsmore stated, together with 258 homicides, 146 lacking individuals, and 40 unidentified human stays, with extra that is probably not logged within the database.
And whereas DNA can usually help solve and prosecute crimes, it could actually additionally help clear those that had been wrongly accused.
“One of the cool things about DNA is it exonerates people as much as it might convict someone,” Newman stated. “DNA doesn’t have a side.”
This story was produced by The Salt Lake Tribune and reviewed and distributed by Stacker.
