Unsolved Cold Cases Genetic Genealogy Could Solve Next

The Queue Behind the Headlines

For every resolved case like the Golden State Killer or the Bear Brook murders, dozens of comparable investigations sit in the testing queue. The constraint is not technique, which has been stable and improving since 2018. The constraint is a combination of sample quality, laboratory capacity, genealogist hours, prosecutorial prioritization, and in a small number of cases, the lingering legal ambiguity over law enforcement use of consumer genealogy databases.

The case profiles that follow represent the most credible near-term candidates as of late 2025. Each has preserved DNA of analyzable quality, active investigative interest, and the political and legal infrastructure required to carry an identification to arrest.

The Zodiac Killer

The Zodiac Killer murdered at least five people in the San Francisco Bay Area between December 1968 and October 1969, taunted police with cryptograms and letters, and was never publicly identified. A partial DNA profile was developed from saliva residue on envelope flaps and stamps from the killer’s mailed letters, and in 2021 a private investigative group called The Case Breakers publicly named Gary Francis Poste as the Zodiac based on circumstantial evidence. The FBI and Vallejo Police Department have not confirmed that identification.

The remaining forensic task is developing a usable SNP profile from the Zodiac DNA sufficient for genealogy search. The sample is degraded by age and by decades of handling. The Vallejo Police announced in 2024 that whole genome sequencing work was underway with a genealogy partner, but no identification has been announced.

The Long Island Serial Killer (Pre-Heuermann Cases)

The July 2023 arrest of Rex Heuermann resolved the core of the Gilgo Beach investigation, but at least two additional victim profiles from the same stretch of Ocean Parkway have remained unconnected to Heuermann and are being worked independently. The Suffolk County Police Department has declined to specify which remaining cases are in genealogy testing, but public records indicate that DNA from the unidentified Manorville victim and from the 2011 Jane Doe No. 6 remains under active analysis.

The West Mesa Bone Collector

Between 2003 and 2005, at least eleven women were murdered and buried on the West Mesa outside Albuquerque, New Mexico. Their remains were discovered by a dog walker in February 2009. The case has no publicly named suspect. DNA was recovered from several of the victims and from a small number of crime scene items. The Albuquerque Police Department and the FBI have confirmed that genealogy work is in progress, though progress has been slow due to the degraded condition of the samples and the volume of family tree construction required for eleven distinct profiles.

The Tylenol Murders

In September and October 1982, seven people in the Chicago area died after consuming Tylenol capsules that had been laced with potassium cyanide. The case was never solved. James Lewis, convicted of extortion in connection with the case, was considered the prime suspect for decades and died in July 2023 without being charged with the poisonings. DNA recovered from the original capsule bottles has been periodically reanalyzed. The FBI confirmed in 2022 that the case remains an active investigation and that advanced DNA analysis was being pursued, though the Bureau has not confirmed whether that analysis specifically includes genetic genealogy work.

The Category of Quiet Resolutions

Beyond the famous cases, the largest category of candidate resolutions is the serial rape and homicide cases with CODIS-unmatched DNA profiles that never achieved national attention. The cold cases solved by genetic genealogy count above 650 is heavily weighted toward these quiet resolutions: small-jurisdiction murders from the 1970s and 1980s, victim identifications for Jane and John Doe cases, and serial rape investigations in departments that finally allocated the budget for a genealogy contract.

The next thousand resolved cases will look more like these quiet closures than like the Zodiac. The method has entered the phase where most identifications are not headlines but restorations of name and accountability at the scale of individual jurisdictions doing the slow work of clearing their backlogs.