3 WA Cold Cases Solved Using New Forensic Program

SEATTLE — Attorney General Bob Ferguson joined law enforcement officials Monday for a news conference in Seattle, detailing how a trio of cold cases was solved using a new forensic program. Ferguson said his office's "DNA forensic genetic genealogy program" led detectives to new leads in three separate cases investigations where the trail had gone cold for decades:

• A 2003 violent rape of a 17 year-old in McCleary, Wash.
• 2003 and 2004 violent home invasion sexual assaults in Pullman, Wash.
• A 1995 murder in Kitsap County.

“This sends a message to survivors that we will not give up on cold cases,” Ferguson said. "My office will continue this initiative to help law enforcement close these cases.”

Ferguson's office said none of the cases had active leads before the program began, and DNA profiles submitted to the national crime database, CODIS, were unsuccessful in identifying potential suspects. That database, however, only contains DNA samples from previously convicted offenders.

Forensic genetic genealogy, which investigators have used successfully to solve other cold cases around the state, works by submitting DNA evidence to public databases and building a "family tree" to point detectives in the right direction, utilizing a much wider net.

The Attorney General's Office earmarked nearly $300,000 for law enforcement agencies who need to utilize the service to solve cold cases, and Ferguson said the program has funded 23 cold case investigations to date, including the three that are now solved.

In the McCleary case, detectives asked Ferguson's office for help and the state paid $5,000 to send DNA evidence to a private lab which officials said led them to Paul Bieker, 51, a man with no previous conditions. A jury convicted him on felony rape charges after a three-day trial, and on Friday a Grays Harbor judge sentenced Bieker to 30 years in prison.

Ferguson's office said the program also helped detectives in Pullman arrest a man wanted for several home invasions and rapes in the early 2000s. He pleaded guilty on five charges and will face a sentence between 17 and 23 years in prison.

Kitsap County detectives used the funds to find a match for the suspect in a 1995 murder, where the killer left the body of his 61-year-old victim in a ditch. Detectives submitted DNA from a cigarette butt left at the scene and determined the suspect had died in 2016.

The forensic genealogy effort is part of the Attorney General's broader "Sexual Assault Kit Initiative," designed to clear the state's backlog of untested kits and collect DNA from hundreds of registered sex offenders that have failed to comply with submission requirements.