TUCSON, Ariz. (KGUN) — Thousands of unidentified human remains are at the Pima County Medical Examiner’s Office and one non-profit is trying to identify two of them. Through investigative genetic genealogy, Cold Case Initiative funds this type of testing for genealogists to trace back and organize family trees.

Looking for some weekend listening? Tune in to this past Tuesday’s “Bucks Blue” hosted by Wbcb 1490am radio and Chief Joseph Kelly III of Yardley Boro Police Department to hear what inspired our founders to create the nonprofit Cold Case Initiative and how you can support our mission. Even $10 goes toward DNA analysis to identify victims and catch offenders. If you can’t give monetarily, each share helps spread the word and bring us one step closer to solving cold cases. (Find our current featured cases on coldcaseinitiative.org).

Listen here to our founders Chris McMullin and Tom McAndrew detail some of the cases that inspired them throughout their careers.

Cold Case Initiative (CCI), a nonprofit assisting agencies with funding to offset the cost of techniques used to solve cold cases, violent crimes, missing persons, and unidentified decedents, is pleased to partner with Innovative Forensic Investigations (IFI), an investigative genetic genealogy firm providing services to law enforcement and government agencies nationwide. IFI will provide CCI access to its full suite of investigative genetic genealogy services. CCI will fund any legitimate investigative step needed in a cold case in addition to investigative genetic genealogy.

Today my guest is Retired Homicide Detective Tom McAndrew What we discuss with Tom: How and why he got into law enforcement Pursuing his education while working in law enforcement His involvement in the Pennsylvania State Police Criminal Investigation Assessment Unit Investigative Genetic Genealogy and how it is used in cold cases The initiative he started in Pennsylvania to locate and identify unidentified decedents How he got involved with the Vidocq Society Some examples of cold cases that he helped to solve His thoughts on the most important advancements in forensic investigations throughout his career.

The forensic DNA technology used to identify Philadelphia’s “Boy in the Box” could be critical to finding the names of hundreds of Philadelphia’s anonymous dead dating as far back as 1955.

It was late into a warm Thursday afternoon in May, nearly 4 p.m., when Jesse F. Davis spotted a clothesline floating on the Schuylkill. When he hauled it over, he found it was wrapped around a wooden milk box. He cut the clothesline, and a small, headless, badly decomposed body floated to the surface. Davis, a 43-year-old barge worker from Paulsboro, N.J., called harbor patrol. Thus began the public story of the Girl in the Box, a Philadelphia Jane Doe of whom we know as little today as we did when Davis first found her on May 3, 1962.

It all begins with an idea.

It all begins with an idea.

It all begins with an idea.