A Georgia victim who was set on fire nearly 30 years ago and buried without a name has finally been identified.
The victim was identified as David Brown by the DNA Doe Project, a volunteer nonprofit that uses forensic genealogy to identify unidentified deceased individuals.
Officials with the organization said that Brown was doused in kerosene and set on fire by an unknown assailant just blocks away from his home in Atlanta. Brown's family reported him missing, but his disappearance was not connected to the case. Brown was buried as John Doe in 1996.
Danielle DiPasquale, the founder of the Find Our Missing Facebook group, shared Brown's story with the DNA Doe Project last year, and the Fulton County Sheriff's Office provided a sample earlier this year.
"The lack of records prior to 1870 makes African American genealogical research very challenging," Lance Daly, a genetic genealogist, said. "We discovered an ancestor from the 19th century who was born in Lincoln County, GA, but later died in Atlanta. This led us to hypothesize that our John Doe had deep family ties to Atlanta and may have been born there."
The organization was able to identify "John Doe" as David Brown four months later.
"We are proud to have been able to finally identify him after so many years," team co-leader Rebecca Somerhalder said. "Most of our cases are very complex and we are extremely grateful to those who upload their DNA to GEDmatch and FamilyTreeDNA to assist us in our work."
