Marie R. O'Brien was a young woman whose remains were found while tearing down a factory in Joliet, Illinois. The building had been abandoned for several years and was frequented by transients.
She was identified by Othram in March 2023.
Case[]
O'Brien's skeletal remains were found in a junk pile at a landfill being used to store rubble from the demolished Rust Craft Greeting Card Company building in Joliet, Illinois. The building was abandoned in 1986 and had been frequented by transients and criminals. In 1992, the building caught fire and was ordered to be demolished. In 1997, the remaining debris of the factory was to be cleared out and taken to the dump. It was there her bones were found in the debris. No cause of death could be determined and it was suspected she had died at some point after 1986 and before the fire.
Although she was initially assumed to be mixed race with majority black ancestry based on preliminary testing conducted by Parabon Nanolabs, Othram's research discovered she was actually fully Northern European. Isotope testing also indicated she may have grown up in the northern United States or Canada.
Sources[]
- Marie O'Brien at the Doe Network
- DNASolves