Episode 506 - Dry Bones and DNA / Cul-De-Sac Killer

Case #1 begins in the city of Redondo Beach where a bag of dry bones was discovered in 2001 by plumbers working at a residential construction site. Workers initially thought the bones were not human, but someone decided to call 911, which sparked a multi-year journey that led investigators from a Jane Doe to recently identifying Catherine Parker-Johnson. Now, if investigators could only find who killed Catherine and why. Case #2 involves a 20-year-old man who was killed for no apparent reason. How does a gaming nerd with a spotless record, loving family, and a fulltime job, get shot in cold blood at a cul-de-sac in an industrial part of El Monte, California?

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
You're listening to kf I AM sixtyon demand, KFI AM six forty live
everywhere on the iHeartRadio app. Onany given day in southern California, hundreds

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of investigators are working more than tenthousand unsolved cases. That's thousands of friends
and families who have lost loved ones, thousands of people who got away with
a crime, and thousands of murdererswho still walk the streets. Killers who
may be your neighbor, go toyour church, or could be dating a
close friend. For the next twohours will highlight cases that have gone cold,

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baffled investigators, or just needs thatone witness to speak up. This
is used with Steve Gregory Redondo BeachPolice Department cold case number zero one six
one six six, the murder ofKatherine Parker Johnson. This is our first

(01:23):
case with the Redondo Beach PD.Recently, the department had a press conference
to announce the identity of a JaneDoe dating back to twenty oh one.
It was a fascinating case where today'stechnology helped advance a case from the past.
I reached out to Lieutenant Jeff Mendentz, who put me in touch with
Detective John Skipper. Skipper not onlywas on the scene back in one,
but he started the department's cold caseunit in O six, shortly after his

(01:47):
retirement, and this became one ofhis first priorities. Detective Skipper invited us
to meet him at the Redondo BeachPolice Station's Investigations Division where he reviews the
case of the dry Bones in DNASo. August twenty ninth, two thousand
and one, there were construction workers. They were doing this major remodel of

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a residence on sixteen twenty four WallacottStreet in Redondo Beach, and some plumbers
were putting down a main line andthey came across a bag, plastic bag,
and inside this plastic bag, theyopened it and they discovered a partial

(02:30):
human skeleton, did not have askull significantly. There was also the remnants
of some other really even to thisdate unknown material in that bag, some
type of synthetic or artificial material thatthe body may have been wrapped up in.

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However, the plumbers at the timethought it was not human remain and
they tossed the bag aside. Subsequentto that, city Redando Beach building inspector
came out and came across this bagand noticed that he felt they were human
remains. He called the police departmentand the police responded. We initiated an

(03:16):
investigation. We believed they were humanremains. Contacted the LA Coroner's office and
the FBI forensics team did a significantexcavation of the entire backyard and at the
end of that we were left witha partial human skeleton. The skull and

(03:38):
other random bones were missing. Weinitiated rather intensive investigation. For a while,
there was little or no clues.We were trying to obtain the identity
of residents, previous residents of thelocation. The house had been a rental.

(04:01):
It was placed there in nineteen fiftyfour, moved from Wilmington to the
one ten freeway was being constructed.This house was purchased and moved intact from
Wilmington to Dando Beach nineteen fifty four. Had a series of owners, almost
all of whom rented it and didnot have records. The owners had either

(04:26):
passed away or they had no recordof the renters, so it made it
difficult. We did that investigation.Just a few weeks later, the attacks
on the World Trade Center in NewYork nine to eleven happened, and law
enforcement everywhere was trying to determine whattheir role was going to be in this

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terrorism and people were being pulled Ihappened to be the lieutenant in charge of
investigations at the time, and Igot detailed to to do a project on
what the role of law enforcement andterrorism would be. So I got pulled
away, some of the other investigatorswere pulled away. That coupled with the
fact that the DNA technology that wehave today was not in place. In

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there was DNA because we were ableto extract from the bone enough DNA to
put a to enter it into thecode as system for future identification, but
the ability to use DNA in themanner in which it is used today did
not exist. So all of thosethings after about a month, stonewall the

(05:36):
investigation and it went cold. Sothat's kind of an overview of what happened.
Yeah, I didn't even think aboutthe fact that you're talking about nine
to eleven in how that that putan end too, put an into a
lot of things for law enforcement andinvestigation wise, because our country changed absolutely

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and I can't I didn't even thinkabout, you know, pending cases and
cold cases I didn't even think aboutwhat that would have done to those it
did, you know, Because sadly, when you're a police department, a
smaller agency like Redondo Beach at thetime, you know you've got tim detectives
maybe that are working assaults, devsburglaries, robberies, etc. We back

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then we conducted our own homicide investigations. This was a cold case. The
clues were minimal, the leads wereminimal, and it was just one of
those things that we've got pulled overinto doing other things that impacted our manpower
even more. So, all ofthat came together and it just this investigation

(06:48):
just stalled and nothing happened on itfor many years. So detective, how,
how how that kind of impact youwhen you know that, you know,
you've got these cases that are sittingonto the sign, and you're like,
you know what, just the realityis, we can't focus on those
anymore. We have life changing,life altering events happening in front of us.

(07:11):
Was that was that on your mindas well? Or did you have
to compartmentalize and say, I reallyhave to let this go for now,
or was that really weighing on youthat you have pending cases well, certainly
pending cases. You know, it'sjust one of those decisions that management makes.
I was part of management at thetime. The chief police ultimately made
the decision that, you know,we weigh everything out, what is the

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likelihood of solving this case with thetechnology that ultimately led to the identification of
the victim. Well, it's happened, you know, just this year,
you know, over twenty years later, so that technology evolved, but it
hadn't evolved at that point in time, so it was unlikely that we would
have been able to identify the victimat all at that period of time.

(08:00):
And just a decision was made,a business decision was made that current cases
are going to take that priority.Figured out what we're going to do about
terrorism as a local law enforcement agencyis going to take a priority. And
this case, that where we've gotsome partial bones and the pre eminent method
of identification at the time, youknow, dental records and things like that

(08:24):
was an impossibility because the entire skullwas missing. It was just a decision
that unfortunately was made. You know, before we go to break, I
do want to ask because you didsay bones were missing from the skull and
that at one point, there werelike construction folks or plumbers or contractors that
you said that they didn't even thinkit looked like human remains. So what

(08:46):
condition were those remains in? Well, they were they were dry bones basically.
But I think, you know,it was a matter of not having
the training and ability to recognize individualdry bones that weren't assembled in the form
of a skeleton. You know,there was just a bunch of a bag

(09:07):
of bones, and the ID Ithink in the construction worker's head might have
been you know, once the chancesthere's human bones bared here, it's probably
a dog or something got it.When we come back, we'll talk more
with Detective John Skipper. He's withthe Redondo Beach Police Department's cold case Unit.
You're listening to KFI AM sixty ondemand, kf I AM six forty

(09:28):
live everywhere on the iHeartRadio app.I'm Steve Gregory. This is Unsolved Welcome
back. We're inside the Redowdo BeachPolice Department's Investigative Division and we're talking with
Detective John Skipper about a cold casefrom more than two decades ago. We'll

(09:48):
explain a little bit more in detail. Detective Before the break. We were
talking about the discovery of these bones. You described him as dry bones,
so you were actually the one ofthe responding detectives to this, right.
I was the lieutenant in charge ofthe Investigations division at the time, so

(10:09):
I went out to the scene acouple of times just to observe it,
to be able to report back tomy bosses, etc. Did you see
the bag of bones? Yes,I saw the bag of bones that well,
initially, I let me think aboutthat. I did ultimately see the
bag of bones. I can't rememberif it was the first day or what

(10:31):
period of time, but yes,I did see the bag of bones well.
And the reason I asked is thatas an investigator, when you see
a bag of dry bones like that, I mean, if it was a
plastic bag, or was it kindof a it was a plastic bag,
what do you make of that?I mean, what was your first instinct
when you see a bag of drybones like that? Well, and knowing

(10:52):
that they were mostly human or probablyhuman, right, knowing that they were
they were mostly human, My personalopinion was I just started running through my
mind the procedures of the investigation,what we could do one step at a
time, at that time, itwas the excavation of the yard, trying
to determine it there was any otheritems evidential are items there? There were

(11:16):
other bones there, you know,a murder weapon we didn't know at the
time, and then trying to talkwith my sergeants and determine, you know,
short term goals for the investigation.The first things that we were going
to do. We had people outinterviewing, canvassing the entire neighborhood, interviewing

(11:37):
people. We had people trying toget a property history of the people that
lived there. So I really kindof was in the role of a manager
trying to determine what course of thiswas going to take. I think what
I'm really curious about, though,is as an investigator, if you're not

(12:00):
finding the bag of bones, letme rephrase, if you're not finding the
skeleton sort of in a shallow grave, and that it even has the appearance
of it being intact, even overthe years it would separate. But but
the fact that someone took the timeto put bones in a bag, did
that tell you anything? No,I don't think it told me anything conclusive.

(12:24):
I think there are, like manyparts of investigations, a lot of
times, there are a number ofconceivable explanations for why something has taken place.
So it seemed logical to me foreither bones or a body. And

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you know, frankly, we didn'tknow that at the time. It was
this just bones that was put inthere, or was it put in as
a body and then did it decomposeinto the bones or did it decompose at
another location and then they picked upthe bones and put the bones in here.
So there were a number of explanations, and you know, as an
investigator, you want to consider thoseexplanations, then determine what's reasonable and not,

(13:11):
and then try to pursue those reasonableexplanations to determine which one is the
actual factual explanation. It's so funnybecause you're so calm about it. If
I were, if I saw abag of bones like that, it kind
of freaked me out a little bitbecause it's like someone took the time to
put bones in a bag. Imean, are we talking a small bag,

(13:33):
a large trash bag was it?Or the standard type of a kitchen
bag. Yeah, So now whetherto your point where you have to think
of all of the possibilities that youknow, maybe someone thought it was a
pet or a dog or something likethat, and they just put all the
bones in a bag. But itjust seems to me very odd, in

(13:54):
very maccab that someone took the timeto put well, as we know human
bones now, but put them ina bag and just isolate them like that
just seems odd to me. Butyou you're so pragmatic about it. But
I'm sitting there in my head going, this is weird. This is so
weird. Well, you know,let me let me put it this way.
In my time in law enforcement,I have learned that people do a

(14:18):
lot of weird things, and alot of you can't explain, you know,
if you as an individual, Ithink a mistake that you can make
as an investigator is take your worldviewand then make decisions based upon Nobody would
do that only because you wouldn't doit. But there's a lot of people

(14:39):
out there that would do things thatyou wouldn't do. So I think have
to consider everything. Okay, sonow I'll get past the bones thing.
We'll move past the bones. Butbut it's an important part here because it
really helps you to move this casealong. And you also said there was
other material in the bag. Alongwith it. Did that yield anything for
you? You said something might havebeen synthetic. Yeah, I'm gonna I'm

(15:03):
gonna say at this point in time, I would like to leave it with
there was other material in that bag. I will tell you that we have
not identified that other material, andwe are trying to do so, got
it, But I don't want toget more specific with that right now.
Well, and then was there anyclothing? No, no clothing, okay?
And then the skull the part ofthe skull, and you said that

(15:26):
bones missing, So were there actualbones that would make up the body proper
missing? And then there were partsof the skull missing or there was just
no skull all together. The entireskull was missing. And then there were
other bones from various body parts youknow, that were that were missing.
And I don't have a list ofthose in front of me, but I

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know that there were there were smallbones that were missing. But it's safe
to say that the entire skeleton wasnot present. So what happens next?
You've seen nine to eleven comes putseverything on on pause. You've determined that
this you don't have the resources toreally dig into this case any further.
So you literally have to put iton the back burner. When does the

(16:12):
case come back up on your radar? Well, and I did want to
make that clear, is that whateverything you just said is accurate. But
had we had what we felt wouldbe more workable information, you know,
records of all of the renters andthings of that nature, we would have

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still pursued this if we felt itwas a workable case. So part of
the whole thing was the solvability factorsof this case didn't rise to the level
that we thought anything that we coulddo we felt was not going to get
us to solve this case. Thathas got to be one of the most
frustrating things from an investigator, andthat's also very frustrating thing for families,

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for the families of victims too thatare victimized by crime like this, because
they all think that their case isthe most important case, and then there
are reasons that you have to makethese hard decisions. So I'm glad you
brought that up. When we comeback, we'll talk more with Detective John
Skipper from the Redunda Beach Police Department, But first this is unsolved with Steve
Gregory on kf I AM six forty. You're listening to kf I AM six

(17:15):
forty on demand, kf I AMsix forty live everywhere on the iHeartRadio app.
I'm Steve Gregory and this is UnsolvedWelcome Back. We're inside the Redownda
Beach Police Department's Investigations Division. We'retalking with Detective John Skipper. He's with

(17:38):
the cold case unit. In fact, one of the things I do want
to mention is that you started thecold case unit. I did, and
when did you start that? Iretired in two thousand and six in December,
and you know I got the chiefsso ka the chief at that time,
Chief Leonardi, He gave the okayto start this. So when I

(18:00):
retired after a career as a regularhere, I transitioned immediately to a Level
one reserve police officer, so thatstill has basically the same powers as a
full time police officer. And Istarted in two thousand and seven and I
did a lot of just housekeeping stuff, organizational stuff for that first year.

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And then my partner, who wasRick Peterson, he was a sergeant here.
He retired in two thousand and sevenat the end of the year.
So we began in earnest in twothousand and eight working these cases, and
we have since within the last twoyears, added on two additional persons to

(18:47):
the unit, a crime analyst andanother officer who was never a regular officer
but as a fifty year reserve officerand he does a lot of stuff for
us too. So do you havethe budget for this? I mean does
the department of a budget for this? This is a totally unbudgeted unit.
We work for free, all ofthe volunteers, and there have been times

(19:10):
when we have needed to travel.There have been times when we have needed
to pay for DNA like this.The particular case, the DNA extraction and
in process to help identify this personwas five thousand dollars and there was no
budget for that. We went tothe Dando Beach Police Foundation and they donated

(19:33):
five thousand dollars to us. Rotaryis donated thousands of dollars to us for
travel. So we're totally unbudgeted.I'll be Dawn, I think that's really
cool. That is genuinely a communityoriented policing. I think so. I
think that's fantastic. Okay, Detectiveback to the case at hand. Well,
let's bring everyone back up to speed. We're talking about the discovery of

(19:53):
some bones in a bag in twothousand and one at a home that was
in a part of a construction sitereconstruction site. A home had been delivered,
it was being worked on and excavatedand whatnot, and in the process,
some workers found this bag of bones. You're the lieutenant in charge of
the investigations division at the time.You're involved. You say, now you've

(20:18):
taken it to the lab. Butthen nine to eleven happens. There's not
much you can do. And beforethe break you were explaining that you really
have to make these hard decisions.You have to really sit down and go
what is solvable, what is notsolvable, What do we have the resources
for, what do we have thetechnology to handle? And you have to
make those hard decisions, those hardchoices. And you made that choice.

(20:41):
It's like, listen, we can'ttake this case any further. And you
were hamstrung by little did you knowat the time, hamstrung by DNA.
But apparently you still kept the evidenceand kept the bones or did you keep
everything? Yes, we kept everythingthat we had that is correct. So

(21:02):
next step what happens? When didyou put ice back on this case.
So in twenty nineteen, so wejust wrapped up another homicide in twenty eighteen,
we got a conviction on that andin early twenty nineteen we took kind
of a break at the end ofthe year, came back and we picked

(21:23):
this case up. We picked thiscase up because certainly we were aware of
it, but genetic genealogy a technology, had been in the news. It
probably came about a few years beforethat, but I had been hearing about
it. My partner had been hearingabout it, and we thought it might

(21:44):
be able to help us with thiscase. So we thought we would bring
it back. We contacted the coroner'soffice. They had a section of femur
bone that they got to us,and we started the investigation. And where
did you go next? Well,I went to the California Department of Justice

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and they were just learning about geneticgenealogy. Now they knew about genetic genealogy
of the general public knew about it, but I'm talking about in a more
academic and professional way. They werethey were just exploring that type of an
investigation. And a person with theDepartment of Justice Missing Person Unit said,

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look, we'd be glad to helpyou to the extent that we can.
But there is a nonprofit group withsome genealogists. They're called the DNA Doe
Project. And they said, youknow, right at this moment in history,
and I think this has changed sincethen, but right at that moment
in history, they felt that thesenonprofit groups, DNA Doe Project in particular,

(23:00):
help us more than could the Departmentof Justice. So I called the
DNA Doe Project. I lived downin Orange County and just coincidentally, a
co founder of the DNA Doe Projectlived about a mile and a half from
me, so I was able tomeet them in person to run the case

(23:22):
by them, and they said,yeah, I think this is something we
can help you do. And thenthat started. Just you know, what
was about a four year process,a very interesting process of determining the identity
of this person. Interesting, howwell it was just there's a number of

(23:42):
things that come to mind when Italk about how interesting it was. So
let's start with the bones. Sowe began this investigation with a slice of
femur bones. So if you canenvision a femur bone, you know,
I don't know, eighteen twenty inches. Ever, how long they are.
They just took a slice out ofthis that was about the some point between

(24:06):
the sides of a quarter and ahalf dollar and a little bit thicker,
and that's what they sent us.So I contacted the DNA DOE project.
They referred me to a gentleman andvolunteer in Texas and this was the first
stage of this with extracting new DNAfrom that bone. I mentioned before that

(24:30):
at the crime scene site in twothousand and one, we were aware that
there was such a thing as aDNA and DNA investigations and a much lower
level than it is now. Butthey the corner's office, was able to
extract DNA at that time to createa profile to put in the CODIS system.

(24:56):
So that was already there. Andin fact, in this investigation we
had also had a couple We hada missing female body with homicide the Torrence
Police Department had done and they neverfound the body, and we compared our
DNA to that. We'd done thata couple of times unsuccessfully. It wasn't
a match, but there was DNAin the system. In order to create

(25:21):
a genetic genealogy profile, it requiredadditional DNA and a different process. So
okay, we're gonna have to takea break there, so hold that thought.
We come back with Detective John Skipper. I mean, I've been fascinated
with this, but I got totake a break. When we come back,
more on this fascinating case. Butfirst, this is Unsolved with Steve
Gregory kf I AM sixty. You'relistening to kf I AM sixty on demand

(25:45):
kf I AM six forty heard everywherelive on the iHeartRadio app. I'm Steve
Gregory and this is Unsolved. Ifyou're listening on the app, you can
send us a tip about a case, a story idea, or a comminent
about the show. Just tap thered microphone on the app and record your
message. Welcome back. We're insidean interview room of the Investigations Division of

(26:10):
the Redondo Beach Police Department. It'sour first case with Rodondo BEACHPD. We're
talking with Detective John Skipper about afascinating case where DNA played a major role
in the identification. But we stillneed to find According to the detective,
we need to find how she diedand who did it. So we're going
to talk a little bit more aboutthat. But first before the break,
John, I felt so guilty becauseyou were on this fascinating narrative about this

(26:37):
DNA doe project and that you hadtaken a slice of a femur from this
bag of bones that was provided bythe La County Medical Examiner. You sent
it to somebody in Texas as partof the DNA doe project and they said
step one, because you call itvery interesting, steps along the way,
they had to extract new DNA outof this disc of bone. And that's

(27:00):
kind of where you left off.Yes, that's exactly correct. So it
went like this, the DNA doeproject would they had several laboratories that were,
you know, utilizing this developing technologythat they would go to and I

(27:23):
don't remember the name of them,but they would send it to a laboratory.
I would get a call in abouta month and the gentleman in Texas
would say, well, they didn'tget a sample, they couldn't get enough
of a sample, or couldn't geta quality sample. However, there's a
new technology that's come about and wecan try that at this lab. So

(27:48):
we did that, and we didthat at least two times. Months would
go by and he would call meand say the exact same thing. There's
a new technology. So ultimately theysent it to a lab that was able
to extract DNA and sequence it.And I'm not a scientist, but I
know they were able to sequence itin the proper manner to allow for some

(28:14):
type of a preliminary identification. Nowit was miles away from telling us who
the person was, but it wasable to tell us for the first time
that we knew it was a femalefrom the anthropologist, but we did not
know a race. And so wehad been looking at missing persons of all
races because there was at the sametime that this DNA investigation was going on,

(28:40):
my partner and I were doing moreof a traditional investigation, trying to
locate former residents, trying to lookat all missing persons in the South Bay
area, those types of things.So after two years of this repeated,
well we didn't get it this time, but there's something new. They finally
got a profile and they create aprofile, and so we started in January

(29:02):
of twenty nineteen. In late inDecember, just before Christmas of twenty twenty,
I got a call and they said, we've got a profile that we'll
be able to upload into the jetmatch public database, and we know it's
an African American female. And thatwas the first big break that we had
because right away we could set aside, you know, the dozens of missing

(29:25):
persons reports that we had and focuson African American females. Isn't amazing,
I mean, and we need tothink about how quickly the technology is evolving
even in real time. We're like, well, but there's being held off
a couple months at a time becausethere's yet another new technology. But then
ultimately from a small disc of femurbone, they were able to determine this

(29:47):
was an African American woman. Correct. That seems fascinating, Correct, And
so now what Well, so aprocess then is initiated. So I went
from talking to the scientists that withthe volunteer scientists that was helping with the
DNA to the volunteer genealogist, awoman named Missy Koski and her partner of

(30:15):
a guy named Carl Koppelman, andhe coincidentally lives in Torrance. The other
lady lives out in Texas. Thesepeople are volunteers, are all over the
country. Again, we were fortunateand we got a guy that lived in
Torrance, so we could meet withhim person to person. So the process,
really simplified version of it is likethis. They take that genetic sample

(30:40):
and they enter it into the DNAprofile is entered into a public genealogy database
called jet match, and that's public, so they can get into that and
they see if they can come upwith based on that profile in that system,
any relatives of this person. AndI mean I say relatives. You

(31:03):
know, we're out third fourth cousin, and they did. They found a
woman in Pennsylvania that had a geneticconnection to our Jane Doe. Now I'm
not going to get into the weeds, but just for you and your listeners
knowledge to kind of figure out whatwe're talking about. The DNA that we're

(31:29):
talking about here is measured in somethingcalled Sento Morgan's all right, So if
you are the blood, the motherand a mother daughter relationship would have about
a three thousand and five hundred cineMorgan relationship, right, that's a mother
daughter a sister would have about atwenty five hundred relationship. The first hit

(31:53):
that we got from this woman inPennsylvania was a one hundred and thirty one
cent to Morgan she was a longway out there. Disa long way out
there. However, from that bit, our genealogists were able to go back
to about the eighteen fifties. Andthe first thing that they told us is

(32:15):
this family lived in the area ofHolly Springs, Mississippi. So that's a
small community near the Tennessee border.And then there was another part of the
family in another part of Mississippi.But Holly Springs, Mississippi will get interesting
towards the end of this, andI'll tell you why. But that was

(32:36):
the first thing they told us.All Right, so we've got this person
that's one hundred and thirty one cinamoreganrelative of our Jain done. Once they
get DNA from a person, theycan then add that to and they start
building a family tree. So everytime you get a DNA sample from one
person, your goal is to havethat lead you to a closer relative,

(33:00):
if that makes sense. So thenthe next two years, that's what we
did. We would go out.They would give us a list of names
of potential relatives of the Jane Doeand they were all over the United States.
And the course of this investigation,in four years, we contacted people
and I think seven different states.Wow, we contacted over sixty people.

(33:25):
Now, a lot of people don'twant you to get their DNA. Sure,
most people don't want you to gettheir DNA. And you know we
would have to call them and coachhim and cajole them, and Okay,
before you go any further, wegot to take another break, believe it
or not. Okay, So whenwe come back, try to pick up
that thought. We're talking with DetectiveJohn Skipper with the Rodonda Beach Police Department,

(33:50):
and we'll have more with him.But first, this is unsolved with
Steve Gregory kf I AM sixty.You're listening to kf I AM sixty on
demand k if I AM six fortyheard everywhere live on the iHeartRadio app.

(34:12):
I'm Steve Gregory and this is unsolved. If you're listening on the app,
you can send us a tip abouta case, a story, idea,
or a comminent about the show.Just tap the red microphone on the app
and record your message. Welcome back. We're inside an interview room part of

(34:39):
the Investigations Division of the Rodondo BeachPolice Department. It's our first case with
Rodondo BEACHPD. Before the break detective. You are talking about this fascinating run
on this DNA DO project who hasvolunteers all over the country. And you

(35:00):
said before the break that this sliceof femur bone ultimately led to not only
identification of the race of your victim, which is an African American woman,
but that she has relatives spread outall over the United States. Right,
correct? And that and as toyour point for the break, not everyone

(35:21):
wants to be identified, Not everyonewants to be found, and people are
still trying to balance that. Idon't want you to have in my DNA
too, well, I don't mindmy DNA, so because I know that's
part of the success with this,people have to voluntarily put their DNA into
a system. Is that correct?With the gen match and the DNA DOE
project. Correct. So you've identifiedsome relatives now, albeit very distant.

(35:45):
You described what's next so as wewould if you're just building upon your previous
success in obtaining DNA, trying toget closer and closer and closer. So,
yeah, like I said, morerelatives than not refuse to give us
DNA, politely refused. The interestingthing is the police do not get the

(36:08):
DNA. We help locate the peopleand ask them to provide it. If
they provide it, they either giveus sample to put in ancestry, or
if they're already in ancestry the database, they allow the DNA DOE project.
So the DNA DOE project keeps allthe DNA. The police department only identifies

(36:32):
the people and ask them to giveit, so we never get the DNA,
so we couldn't look up, youknow. But anyway, so we
keep doing that and it became overwhelming, honestly for my partner or not,
because we're doing other parts of thisinvestigation. Again, we're retired, we
do this part time. I broughton a crime analyst to help us locate
people, retired crime analyst. Hername's Don Switzer. She's an expert at

(36:55):
locating people through various law enforcement databases. And about on another reserve officer who's
been a reserve officer for fifty yearsand he's just got great administrative skills,
and he took over the task oflocating people and calling them to get their
DNA. So he did that fora good solid year. We did it

(37:15):
for the year before that. Whatultimately happens is after going through this process
over and over, and like Isay, sixty different people, most of
which said sorry, no DNA.He finds the DNA DOE project tells us
of a gentleman in Gilroy, California, who they felt was in this treat

(37:38):
Now they had no idea what howclose of a relationship, but they did
feel he was in this family tree. So Mike Stark, our other officer,
drives up to Gilroy, collects aDNA sample far I means an elderly
gentleman, and he collects the DNAsample the DNA dope. Roget calls us

(38:00):
back and they tell us we areabout four hundred and sixty cinamoregans on him,
which is just shy of a firstcousin. So if I ask you
who your third cousin is, youmay not know him, but you know
your first cousins. So they builtthe tree, and there was fifteen first
cousins that this guy had, soour guy might start called every one of

(38:21):
them. And a little over halfwaythrough he gets to someone who says,
oh, yeah, my sister wentmissing from Memphis, Tennessee in nineteen seventy
seven. Now I mentioned Holly Springs, Mississippi, was the first place we
heard, well, Holly Springs,Mississippi is on the Mississippi side of the
border, but it's a suburb ofMemphis, Tennessee. So that was the

(38:43):
first thing that they knew. Sowe found out the name of this person
from the sister. We found outthat she left Memphis, Tennessee and about
nineteen seventy seven coming to California.The sister of the missing person directed us

(39:07):
to the daughter of the missing person, who told us more. She said,
my mother was a drug addict.She was marginalized. That would be
the term that we would use today. She had a difficult life here.
She came back to visit me innineteen eighty one and in May, and
that's the last I've seen her.With that information, we start running law

(39:32):
enforcement databases. We find that thisperson had been arrest Oh, I'm sorry.
The daughter did also mention she gotone letter from her mother in Inglewood,
So Inglewood is about five miles fromwhere these bones were found. The
law enforcement databases showed us that thisperson had numerous misdemeanor arrest many of them

(39:55):
drug related, in the Inglewood Lennoxarea, and the last law enforcement contact
with her was in August of nineteeneighty one, and she would be frequently
arrested from her time in California fromseventy seven till eighty one, there was
numerous arrest for her and she wasnever arrested again, never heard from again.

(40:22):
So we felt comfortable that we wereon to the right person. We
then had a sample a DNA samplecollected from the mother and daughter, and
we had that done not through ancestry, well, we did it through ancestry
first, but we had to ultimatelydo a confirmation from the Department of Justice

(40:45):
because for an official confirmation, andwe had the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation collect
that sample for us. That wasin about late March early April. They
did that of this year, twentytwenty three, and that came back because
I had stated earlier the daughter motherrelationship was thirty five hundred centa morgans and

(41:06):
the sister was about twenty five hundredcenta morgans, exactly what we would expect.
So the Department of Justice and theLa County Corner then said that this
is a positive identification of Captaine ParkerJohnson, our missing person. When we
come back, we'll talk more aboutKatherine Parker Johnson, because you had a
press conference recently too to announce thisand but what a fascinating journey. And

(41:30):
then we'll also talk about what itis you need at this point. But
first, this is Unsolved with SteveGregory on kf I AM six forty.
You're listening to kf I AM sixforty on demand kf I AM six forty
live everywhere on the iHeartRadio Appum.I'm Steve Gregory. This is Unsolved.

(42:00):
Welcome back. We're inside the RedondoBeach Police Department's Investigations Division. We're talking
with Detective John Skipper. He's retired, but he also runs the department's cold
case unit. In fact, hefounded the unit back in two thousand and
six, and this was a casethat he'd been working on in a case
that he remembers some twenty something yearsago. But up into the break,

(42:21):
you've been giving us this fascinating DNAjourney and started with a bag of dry
bones in a yard of a propertyhere in Redondo Beach. It's ended now
with the identification of a young woman, young girl, Katherine Parker Johnson,
and that was because of the DNADOE project. So Detective right before the

(42:42):
break, you dropped the bomb ofthe identification of Katherine Parker Johnson. What
do we know about this young girl? Well, as I had said,
she was a person that had hada difficult life. She left her home
Memphis, Tennessee, and left twochildren, a son and a daughter.
They were young at the time,and she came to California. She had

(43:08):
was involved in the drug scene,and she was I'm not saying that she
was what we would now call ahomeless person, but she you know,
she lived on the street, maybein motel rooms, things like that.
We don't know that. That's justmy speculation, but I know from some
of her arrest history that would beconsistent with that lifestyle. I have to

(43:31):
ask real quick, and I've referredto as a young girl because I was
like, I'm looking at also photohere, so it was throwing me off
on the age a little bit.Do you have an estimate on her age?
And she would have been Yeah,she was born I believe in nineteen
fifty seven, Okay, and shewas she just the last known contact of
her I believe she was twenty fouryears old. Sorry about that, okay.

(43:52):
I wanted to just clarify that,so so she she led that lifestyle.
She did go home and visit herfamily in nineteen eighty one, never
seen again. Her last known contactwas in August of that year down in
the Lennox Inglewood area, and she'snever resurfaced after that. So what we're

(44:15):
trying to do now is to learnabout her life in California, in the
Inglewood Lenox area. And we don'thave any record of anyone that was an
associate or a friend of her inCalifornia. So we've got her photograph and

(44:36):
what we're hoping to do is gether picture out enough that someone that knew
her back in she was in Californiafrom the mid seventies, say seventy seven
until nineteen eighty one, someone thatrecognizes her could call us and talk to
us about her, her lifestyle,who she knew, where she live.

(45:00):
Those are the things we're trying toput together. Now. I know you've
probably considered all this, but Ido want to ask the question when you
talk about her multiple arrests over theyears, over her time here in southern
California, do enny those police reportsindicate known associates or people she was associated
with, Because I know some policereports will include that kind of detail.

(45:22):
So there was nothing in any ofthose police reports that would give you an
indication of who she was. Idon't know, because we are unable to
locate any of those police reports.We've got, actually, i'd say any.
We've got one booking report from LongBeach that has no information about any
associates, very little information on itabout her. But you know, that's

(45:46):
one of the big problems we findwork in these coal cases, the record
retention capability of many different ages,It varies completely. I needed a report
from the new Port Beach Police Departmentfrom nineteen seventy four relative to this case,
and you know, I had itin thirty minutes. I needed a

(46:07):
report from Redondo Beach from nineteen eightyone, and we don't have it.
So, yeah, you know,And you're right though, you figure how
many pairs of hands have touched thesepieces of paper over the years, and
building people move buildings and relocation.LAPD's the same way, right, The
LAPD's lost a lot of the archives. But well, then to your point,

(46:28):
what about mugshots, DMV photos,nothing, all of those things we
have as we sit here, wehave dove deep into those things trying to
obtain them, and we have notobtained anything as we speak. We've got,
you know, enhanced efforts to tryto obtain those. So sometimes it's

(46:52):
who you talk to, and youknow, when you get to the third
boss, you might be able toget something. And we're doing that and
we're hoping that something's still going tocome in. But right now we don't
have anything like that. So asyou sit here discussing the case, is
there any other evidence at all?I mean, and I don't expect you

(47:12):
to talk about the evidence itself ifyou have it, but is there anything
at all that you're in possession ofthat could give you forward momentum in this
case? Well? There, yes, there is. There is evidence from
the scene that we are trying todo, you know, new DNA technology
on that didn't exist previously, hopingmaybe we'll get something that might lead us

(47:36):
to a suspect. I will tellyou that there are at least two completely
different theories that we are investigating nowthat could lead us to a suspect.
They are unrelated. So if youknow theory A is it, then theory

(47:57):
B is out the window, andvice versa, and it could the theories
see that we don't know about yet. Do you want to share the theories?
Uh? No, I don't thinkI can do that at this point
in time. Well, then,um, do you think, based on
your experience, was Catherine targeted ordo you think she was part of something
else? Well, depending on thetheory. You know, there are theories

(48:21):
out there that she could have willinglybeen involved in something that led to her
death, and there are theories thather lifestyle could have put her in a
position where she would have been randomlytargeted and selected. Before we wrap up
here, detective, do you haveany semblance of a description that you can

(48:44):
share of her? Yeah? Yeah, she was you know, I don't
have the information. She was aslight She was an African American woman of
a medium complexion. I would saythe photograph, you know, shows an
attractive woman again, and her lifestyleat the time she died might have made
her, you know, more gauntand then appearing. I say she was

(49:06):
slight, you know, her weightwas probably a hundred something pounds. I
don't have that information in front ofme. And she was, you know,
under five feet five tall. Ibelieve when you came out publicly with
this information and announced her name.Did you get any calls? We got
calls. You know, when youdo this, and we've done this a

(49:29):
number of times in the past,you know, we get tips that say,
oh, have you thought about JohnPatrick Kearney, Yes, we have.
Have you thought about the Grim Sleeper? Yes, we have talked to
the lead detective on the Grim Sleepercase, and you know it didn't match.
There's a couple of calls that we'vegot that we did do follow ups
and as we speak, we've notreally found that smoking gun. Well,

(49:52):
Detective, I can't thank you enoughfor sharing the story with us, and
let's hope that this generates some morecalls for you as well. Thank you
for having coming up. We headover to Monterey Park, where La County
Sheriff's Detective Steve Blagg is standing byto debrief us on a case from twenty
eighteen. But first, this isUnsolved with Steve Gregory on kf I AM
six forty. You're listening to kfI AM six forty on demand, kf

(50:20):
I AM six forty live everywhere onthe iHeartRadio app. I'm Steve Gregory and
this is Unsolved. La County Sheriff'shomicide case number zero one eight zero zero
zero two four dash three one ninenine zero one one the shooting death of

(50:40):
Fabian Barraja's junior detective Steve Blagg isa friend of the show and wanted us
to feature a case he's been working. Black says, it's a true mystery.
A young man in his twenties,gainfully employed, no game ties,
in fact, he's a gaming nerd, suddenly finds himself on the receiving end

(51:01):
of gunfire and the surveillance video showshe was targeted. Detective Blag breaks down
the case of the cold killer inthe cul de Sac So what Approximately twelve
thirty am on April third, twentyand eighteen, there was a vehicle that
collided through a fence into a businesscomplex on Valley Boulevard, just west of

(51:27):
the six h five freeway. WhenElmanti police officers arrived at the scene,
they found mister Brajas alone in thevehicle in the driver's seat, suffering from
what they later found to be agunshot wound, and he was eventually pronounced
deceased. And the gunshot wound whatpart of the body he sustained it to

(51:53):
his upper torso like the right sideof his upper torso shot one time,
multiple times, one time one time. So you say, on the early
morning hours of twelve thirty in themorning, a vehicle collided into a building.
No, threw a wrought iron fenceinto a building complex, building complex,

(52:14):
So through the rout aff on theproperty. Correct, So the fence
is what stopped the vehicle. No, that he was going at a pretty
high rate of speed and actually probablylanded about a good hundred yards into the
property of the business complex with abig chunk of the fence attached to his
car. What kind of car heat that time? The victim was in

(52:35):
a two thousand and twelve white InfinityG thirty seven. Did corner give you
manner of death homicide? Homicide?But cause of death gunshot, gunshot wound?
What I was getting at was didhe die from the gunshot wound or
die from the car crash? No, he definitely died from the gunshot wound.
Any evidence that the gunshot wound happenedprior to the crash, Yes,

(52:59):
it did so. And if hewas speeding, if he's a high rate
of speed going through this wrought ironfence, was that a reflex? They
were like foot down on the pedalthing or was he still alive? I
mean, we do have some surveillancevideo that kind of shed some light on
what we what happened and what ledto the shooting from that night. Can

(53:19):
you enlightness? Sure? So Fabian'svehicle, there's a small little cool de
sac along the north side of ValleyBoulevard near a scrap metal yard. We
know that shortly before twelve thirty am, we were able to see Fabian's vehicle
pull into this cul de sac fromsouth to north and kind of angle to

(53:40):
where it was going to make aU turn back facing southbound, but stopped.
I was able to see one figureget out of the right front passenger
seat. That figure, to meappeared to be a male. The figure
appeared to be pointing what looked likea fire our arm inside the car,

(54:01):
and then it appeared as Fabian mayhave attempted to get away from that mail
what a shot was fired and causingFabian to now flee at a high rate
of speed southbound on the cul desac across Valley Boulevard and through that fence.
So you saw that, you sawthe shooting. Then the video wasn't

(54:27):
the best, but best I couldmake out. Yes, so if I
heard you right, The person gotout of the car then opened fire.
Person got out of the car appearedto be pointing a gun, possibly at
Fabian. What it appears that Fabian, being afraid and trying to get away,
hits the accelerator as the suspect firesa shot. Okay, So as

(54:51):
so the suspect got a lucky shotoff basically basically, yes, it did.
It was the car too damage.Could you tell if the if the
had gone through a window or windshieldor no. It looked like the door
was open when the suspect fired theshot. So there was no bullet impacts
to that vehicle at all. Andso how far from that scene in the

(55:12):
cul de sac to the wrought ironfancy crashed through? That was maybe about
five hundred yards or so? Fivehundred yards? Yeah, then do you
suppose it was our hospital nearby there? Do you think he was trying to
drive to a hospital or do youthink he knew he was? I guess
you can't really tell if he knewif he was shot or not. It

(55:35):
almost looked like it was simultaneous.Is Fabian's car drives onto the cul de
sac and kind of angles that youturn and stops. The suspect gets out
of the right front passenger seat,and I think that's when Fabian saw his
opportunity maybe to get away from thissuspect. And as he hit the accelerator,
the suspect fires a shot. Andthen that five hundred yards across valley

(56:00):
boulevard because at that point Fabian wasfatally shot and he went across valley and
through that fence where his car cameto arrest, Okay. And then any
type of a description on a shooter, all we can tell is a mail.
There were some transients because to thenorth of that cul de sac or

(56:21):
railroad tracks, there were transients whowere living along the railroad tracks. They
reported seeing a male Hispanic running eastboundon the railroad tracks after they heard what
sounded like a gunshot. But thatwas the only description we could get.
And that area of La Monte,well, first of all, was Fabian
from Elmonty No, Okay? Whereis he from? At the time of

(56:45):
the murder, Fabian resided with familyin the city of Pomona, Okay.
What is that area of Elmonte like? Typically it's all industrial, all industrial
so what took him to that spot? Do you think? We have no
idea. We know that Fabian workedat a machine shop in Walnut. He

(57:06):
worked kind of the swing shift wherehe started about three or three thirty and
would work till about midnight most days, and usually he would close by himself
according to the employer, his employeras well as his father, who also
worked at the same machine shop.So for him to go from Walnut,

(57:29):
TELMANI, we have no reason why. We have no idea why, because
he actually lived in the city ofPomona, which would have been opposite from
ALMANI. Okay, when we comeback, I want to ask you a
little bit more about Fabian and exactlywho he is a little bit of his
background. At first, we're talkingwith Detective Steve Blagg with the Ely County

(57:51):
Sheriff's Department. Thomas Saiberro. Thisis Unsolved Steve Gregory on kf I AM
sixty. You're listening to kf IAM sixty man kf I AM six forty
live everywhere on the iHeartRadio app.I'm Steve Gregory. This is Unsolved.

(58:15):
Welcome back. We're speaking with DetectiveSteve Blagg with the Los Angeles County Sheriff's
Department's Hommside Bureau. We're inside thebureau down in Monterey Park. He's been
telling us about the case of FabianBarajas Jr. A twenty year old who
was shot in the early morning hoursof April third, twenty eighteen, in
an industrial area of El Monty.Before the break, detective, you were

(58:37):
telling us a little bit about Fabian. He worked at a machine shop in
Walnut and worked by himself sometimes,but it was unusual, you said,
because he was trying to figure outwhy he would be either from his workshop
in Walnut or where he lived inPomona. What brought him to El Monty.
Colin so backtracking that friends, relatives, girlfriend, boyfriend, anything that

(59:00):
you know. So we know thatFabian lived with his mother and Pomona.
He did not currently have any significantother. He did not have a girlfriend
at the time. Fabian or ChicoIs his family knew him as was.

(59:20):
He had recently bought the Infinity thatwas kind of like his Pride and Joy,
his first real card that he had. He according to family, Fabian
was kind of a nerdish kid.He loved gaming, He loved anime,

(59:42):
he was into back then in twentyeighteen, big thing was was Pokemon in
chasing Pokemon, and he was intothat as well. But he was just
a normal kid. No criminal recordwhatsoever, no history of drug or alcohol
use that we were able to findat all. He's just a kid.

(01:00:06):
He started working because he wanted tobuy his car. He accomplished that,
but continued working to help his mommake ends meet. So he was an
only child. There were other thereare other children, but yeah, we
none that factor into this case.Okay, So no lifestyle or history with
the siblings that would cause you concern. No, the Pokemon craze. I

(01:00:34):
know it sounds a little unusual rightnow, but the Pokemon craze, there
was a you know, I thinkthere was a trend of them going out
and chasing it. Like you said, right, yes, do you suppose
I mean, did you have anyother cases where people got sucked in on
duped into doing things like this,you know, and then be robbed or
anything like that. I mean,I'm sure you've explored all options, but

(01:00:57):
was that something that you even lookedat? We did, I mean we
looked at his He had a veryvery thin social media presence, so it's
not he Fabian was not into socialmedia. Anything we looked at from regarding
you know, the chasing of Pokemon. We don't believe that that factored into

(01:01:19):
this at all, into his murderwere you know, we have a few
potential theories of what we think happenedwith him inside that car, but nothing
that we can prove at this time. Can you explore one of those theories
with us? I mean, basedupon where Fabian was shot and where he
ended up in ELMANI one working theoryis that he was carjacked. Is he

(01:01:45):
left work? I mean unfortunately,when we went back out to Canvas where
he worked, there were no workingsurveillance cameras in the area of his business.
One, Like I said, oneworking theory is that when he got
off of work, somebody was lyingin for him, either whether it be
somebody he knows or he doesn't know, and this was an attempt carjacking.

(01:02:05):
I mean, they drove him toor they forced him to drive potentially to
a very secluded area in El Money, which that call De Sac. There's
hardly any lights about. The onlyvehicle traffic is on Valley Boulevard and it's
enough out of you to where ifsomebody wanted to rob someone, it's a
perfect spot. Or there was somebodyhe knew that he allowed in the car

(01:02:30):
then at some point decided to maybesteal the car or rob him. We
don't know, because it looks likewhen Fabian attempted to get away is when
he was shot. So based onyour experience going back all these years,
you know, those two seem veryviable theories. Anything unusual about this case

(01:02:52):
that you know, you got yourtheories in place, But is there anything
unusual about this case that you justcan't put your finger on why or one
how the suspect got into his car, especially without leaving any traces of DNA
that I mean, we went throughthat car with a fine tooth comb.

(01:03:12):
There was no traces of DNA otherthan Fabians and no fingerprints, no type
of forensic evidence that can link usto a potential suspect inside of that vehicle.
I mean, I know that there'speople out there that know what happened,
and I'm hoping something like this willbring it bring someone forward to talk
to us. In the surveillance video, you said, all you could really

(01:03:34):
make out was it was a man. You couldn't even make out the ethnicity
though right the race gloves no glovescouldn't tell again due to the poor quality
of the video and the distance ofthe camera. Yeah, it could not
tell. But that's pretty significant ifyou've got a shooter and there's absolutely no
trace of DNA. Is that unusualor is that pretty specific in the world

(01:03:58):
of DNA today, That's pretty unusualonly because whether it be hair follicles,
touch DNA from touching door handles,touched DNA from touching seat belts and seat
belt buckles. Our labs do verygood at getting that type of evidence.
And with this we not one shredof evidence. Wow. Yeah, because

(01:04:24):
you have to open the door,have to get out, get in.
Fabian did not open the door toallow this suspect to get out. That
person who was seated on the passengerseat would have had of the door handle
on their own. Wow. Sowere there any similar crimes detective around that
time that like, was it partof a rash of carjackings or a rash

(01:04:46):
of robberies that you could tell?None that we had seen. Again,
we handled this case at the requestof El Monty Police Department. When I
spoke with their detectives, there wereno series of carjackings in that area or
any reports of victims being brought tothat area to be robbed and then left.

(01:05:12):
Think about the only thing that ElmaniPD had in that area was a
lot of drug use and some prostitution, but there were no signs of that
when we were there that night,nor anything on the video that indicated that
is what led to Fabian's murder.Okay, to wrap this up in your
in your heart and in your experience, what do you think happened? I

(01:05:35):
think Fabian was taken at gunpoint fromeither his where he worked or somewhere close
by, was forced to drive tothis area of Elmani for a robbery,
and when he attempted to get away, he was shot and killed. Detective,
what is it you want from people? I want people with knowledge of

(01:05:59):
this case to come forward to givea call. They can remain anonymous.
They don't not have to leave aname, a phone number, anything,
but just to point us in theright direction for Chico and his family,
just to bring them closure because thishas hit his family hard and this is
a case that we need to solve. Detective, always a pleasure, Thank

(01:06:20):
you for your time. Oh,you're very welcome, thank you, and
that's going to do it. Unsolvedwith Steve Gregory. The radio show is
a production of the KFI News Departmentfor iHeartMedia, Los Angeles and is produced
by Steve Gregory and Jacob Gonzalez.Our field engineer is Tony Sarrantino and our
digital producer is Nate Ward. Tohear this episode and others from past seasons,

(01:06:41):
download Unsolved with Steve Gregory on theiHeartRadio app or wherever you listen KFI
Ami on demand