In June 1981, the upscale town of Livermore, CA was shocked by the double murder of Thomas “Whitey” Green and his wife Alice in their posh home. Police had lots of avenues to investigate, since Whitey ran a very lucrative and very illegal sports betting business with real connections to organized crime, and there were rumors that he had piles of money buried in the back yard. Police even met with a self-professed hit man turned informant who was murdered that same day. In theory, there were innumerable suspects – but there was no prime suspect. Eventually forensic genealogy would uncover what police had missed – thanks to a preserved sexual assault kit and a block of moldy cheese.

In February, 1980, a father and son panning for Gold in the Fly Creek area near Amboy, Washington, found a human skull and alerted authorities to their find. Investigators confirmed the skull was human, and found other bones belonging to the same person. They identified the remains as belonging to a teenage female, and determined she was a homicide victim. No clothes or other belongings of the girl were found, and police could not identify her. Despite their request for tips from the public, the girl known as 'Fly Creek Jane Doe' went unidentified.

On new year’s day 1985, the body of a woman was found lying on the dirt shoulder of a residential street in Pensacola, Florida. She was battered, bloody, and partially undressed. Tonya had last been seen celebrating New Year’s Eve at a local bar with friends – but no one knew when she left, or with whom. Multiple pieces of physical evidence, including semen and hairs, were found on her body, but before the advent of modern forensics, they led nowhere. Multiple suspects remained on the list for years, until DNA testing ruled them out, and police were no closer to finding who killed Tonya than they were in 1985. Then forensic genealogy pointed to a man who was living in the area at the time – and still was. Police arrested Daniel Wells for Tonya’s murder, and prosecutors started to build their case against him when it was all cut short.