'Mr. Bones' Accepted for a DNA Analysis

GRANGEVILLE — Idaho County authorities are hopeful a grant from the Bureau of Justice Assistance will help reveal the identity of a possible homicide victim from 36 years ago dubbed " Mr. Bones."

Lt. Jerry Johnson of the Idaho County Sheriff's Office said Wednesday that the case of "Mr. Bones" has been accepted by the Idaho State Police laboratory as part of a forensic molecular genetic genealogy study funded through a recently announced grant of $150,000. The grant will allow police to look at DNA and genealogical data from regular people who have agreed to put their DNA into public databases. Right now, police have a limited pool of DNA they can look at through the national database.

Johnson said he contacted the state lab and asked researchers there to consider the case of Mr. Bones, whose true identity is a mystery.

"One case that I thought might benefit (from the new technology), and it was accepted, was what we lovingly refer to as 'Mr. Bones,'" Johnson said. A number of detectives have looked at the case through the years, "but he's never been identified. Initially we felt he might have been a homicide victim," but following a forensic review of the initial investigation, other possibilities opened up.

In September 1984, hunters came upon the remains of a human skeleton in a wooded area near the Powell Ranger Station.

Johnson said the partially dismembered body was found with a few articles of clothing and a pair of glasses with one lens missing. No identifying objects were located at that site.

Investigators eventually tied the glasses to an abandoned campsite about a mile away where, a year earlier, some camping gear, additional clothing and a single optical lens were found.

In 1985, the North Idaho Regional Crime Lab created a sketch of what the deceased person may have looked like.

Johnson said during the first anthropological review, "the pathologist felt the victim had possibly been stabbed because of a notch in the ribs."

The remains were sent for a further review to the University of North Texas Center for Human Identification.

Forensic scientists there "felt like it was possible (the wounds were caused) by an animal gnawing on the bones. But, obviously, something violent had occurred," Johnson said.

"The biggest question is: who is the victim?" Johnson added. "There have been a lot of questions since the ISP has accepted this project, and we're hopeful" of getting some answers.

The county, he said, has a number of cold cases in which the victims are known but the perpetrators are not. The most recent case is the murder of LeAnna Maree Bailey, 58, originally from the Seattle area, who had been staying in the Elk City area to clean up the house of her recently deceased father.

Bailey is believed to have died on the night of Sept. 14 or the morning of Sept. 15. Her body was discovered Sept. 19 in the back of her red Saturn sport utility vehicle that had run off an embankment about 3 miles from her residence.

An autopsy performed at the Ada County coroner's office on Sept. 21 revealed Bailey suffered a number of injuries by various means, any one of which could have caused her death.

Investigators have talked to a number of persons of interest and administered polygraph tests, but no charges against anyone have yet been filed. Johnson said Wednesday his office is still awaiting some results of evidence testing from the state lab.

"We don't have too many cases where we have suspect DNA or a victim that's unidentified," Johnson said. "So we're kind of limited on the cases we have that would benefit from this (ISP) project."

Johnson added that researchers will be looking at DNA from perpetrators or victims, then use that DNA profile to establish a family to which the subject might have belonged in an attempt to make an identification. He said it likely will be months before any information becomes available on Mr. Bones.

Hedberg may be contacted at [email protected] or (208) 983-2326.

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