Murder Victim Found in 1978 Identified As East Hampton Woman: Reports

EAST HAMPTON, CT — Decades after her body was found on a logging road in Granby, Massachusetts, police have identified the victim as Patricia Coleman. Coleman, who was killed by a gunshot to the head in 1978, was also known as Patricia Ann Tucker, Patricia Heckman, and Patricia Dale, according to WTNH News-8.

Her remains have been in a Granby cemetery under a headstone marked as "Unknown."

Police said the breakthrough came due to "old-fashioned police work and some recent advances in forensic genetic genealogy,” WTNH News-9 reported. A forensic laboratory called Othram became involved in the case two years ago, using the victim's DNA and forensic genetic genealogy to find a woman in Maryland related to Coleman.

The relative connected authorities to Coleman's son who was 5 years old when she disappeared.

Police said that Gerald Coleman, Patricia Coleman's husband when she died, was identified as a person of interest in the case. Gerald Coleman died in a Massachusetts state prison in 1996, according to NBC CT. He never reported his wife missing.

Gerald Coleman was arrested in 1968 in Hartford with attempted kidnapping, aggravated assault, and carrying a firearm. He was also convicted in 1995 on charges of rape, indecent assault, and battery and assault with a dangerous weapon, NBC CT reported.

The investigation into homicide remains ongoing.

Anyone with information on the case can contact the Granby Police Department by phone at 413-467-9222 or email at jwhite@granbypd.org.