Speaker 1: Imagine you're eating breakfast. You know, you're sitting at your
Speaker 1: kitchen table, just pouring a cup of coffee, maybe watching
Speaker 1: the morning news.
Speaker 2: Right. Just a totally normal mundane Tuesday.
Speaker 1: Exactly. You leave for work. You come home. You sleep.
Speaker 1: You're just living your entire normal daily life in this
Speaker 1: rental house.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: But now imagine that for 16 years, every single tenant
Speaker 1: who moved in and out of that house, like every
Speaker 1: person who walked across that kitchen floor, was living directly
Speaker 1: above a human skeleton.
Speaker 2: Oh, man.
Speaker 1: Yeah, just hidden right there in the crawlspace beneath their feet.
Speaker 1: And today, we're taking a deep dive into a mystery
Speaker 1: that literally sat beneath people's floorboards for over a decade
Speaker 1: and a half.
Speaker 2: Unnoticed, just completely unnoticed while the world kept turning right
Speaker 2: above it.
Speaker 1: Exactly. That's wild. Welcome to the deep dive, everyone. Okay,
Speaker 1: let's unpack this because today we are taking a microscope
Speaker 1: to a single incredibly dense story from local news in Alabama.
Speaker 2: Specifically, this is from ABC 3340. published by Hannah Bazanov
Speaker 2: back in February of 2026. Right.
Speaker 1: And our mission today isn't just to read a news article.
Speaker 1: We are going to deconstruct a massive 38-year timeline.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we want to map the whole journey of a
Speaker 2: single cold case to understand the, well, the almost unimaginable
Speaker 2: evolution of forensic science over that time.
Speaker 1: Because we're going to see how investigators moved from a
Speaker 1: system that was, you know, essentially blind, relying on paper
Speaker 1: flyers and just absolute guesswork, To.
Speaker 2: This incredibly modern era of cellular mapping and forensic genetic
Speaker 2: genealogy that can literally reach backward through time.
Speaker 1: It's basically time travel.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: But to truly appreciate that technological triumph of 2026, we
Speaker 1: have to start by anchoring ourselves in the analog world
Speaker 1: where this all began, right?
Speaker 2: 100%. Because every single DNA database, every genetic sequence we're
Speaker 2: going to talk about today, it's all ultimately rooted in
Speaker 2: one very human, very tragic day in 1988. Yeah. We
Speaker 2: have to understand the void that's created when a person
Speaker 2: just vanishes.
Speaker 1: So let's set that scene. It is Tuesday, November 15th, 1988.
Speaker 1: And we are in a neighborhood called Northeast Lake.
Speaker 2: In Birmingham, Alabama. Right.
Speaker 1: And we're looking at the life of a 21-year-old young
Speaker 1: man named Bryant Keith Bates.
Speaker 2: Bryant is at his family home. He gets dressed. He
Speaker 2: heads out the door. And, well, the information we have
Speaker 2: tells us he was on his way to attend a
Speaker 2: friend's funeral.
Speaker 1: A friend's funeral.
Speaker 2: Mm-hmm.
Speaker 1: And that is it. That is literally the last verified
Speaker 1: moment his family ever saw him.
Speaker 2: He never came home from that funeral.
Speaker 1: Which, I mean, the psychological toll of an ambiguous loss
Speaker 1: like that is just, it's incredibly difficult to quantify.
Speaker 2: Oh, it's paralyzing because when someone dies, there's a body.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: There's a ritual.
Speaker 1: We have a funeral, which he was literally going to.
Speaker 2: Exactly. There's a definitive end that allows the grieving process
Speaker 2: to actually begin. But when someone simply evaporates into the ether...
Speaker 2: The family is plunged into this state of suspended animation.
Speaker 1: Because the human brain is just desperate for closure, right?
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: We need a narrative that makes sense.
Speaker 2: Yes. And without it, you are trapped in a loop
Speaker 2: of endless speculation. Did he run away? Was he hurt?
Speaker 2: Is he coming back tomorrow?
Speaker 1: I can't even fathom the torture of that. It's like
Speaker 1: someone pressing pause on a VHS tape, you know? Yeah.
Speaker 1: But the rest of the world just keeps playing.
Speaker 2: That's a really good way to put it.
Speaker 1: So the hours turn into a night. The night turns
Speaker 1: into the next day. And suddenly... The family is calling
Speaker 1: the Birmingham Police Department to file a missing person report.
Speaker 2: Right. But there is a detail here that makes this
Speaker 2: particular disappearance even more chilling, I think.
Speaker 1: Yeah, the family and the police were entirely aligned very
Speaker 1: early on. Like, right out of the gate, they both
Speaker 1: suspected murder.
Speaker 2: Which is unusual. What would make them jump straight to
Speaker 2: foul play instead of assuming, you know, a 21-year-old just
Speaker 2: ran off to start a new life?
Speaker 1: That's the big question. And it usually comes down to
Speaker 1: behavioral changes.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 1: And context.
Speaker 2: Exactly. Investigators in 1988, they're going to look at Bryant's life. Like,
Speaker 2: did he take his bank book? Did he pack a bag?
Speaker 1: Did you take a car?
Speaker 2: Right. If a person leaves everything they need to survive behind,
Speaker 2: that is your first massive red flag.
Speaker 1: Plus, you have to look at where he was going.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: A funeral?
Speaker 2: Yes. An event heavily steeped in social obligation and, frankly,
Speaker 2: emotional gravity.
Speaker 1: Yeah. A person who intends to voluntarily walk away from
Speaker 1: their life. doesn't usually choose to do it on the
Speaker 1: way to honor a deceased friend.
Speaker 2: The context heavily suggests he fully intended to be at
Speaker 2: that service and to return home afterward.
Speaker 1: Which just adds this incredibly heavy, almost suffocating layer of
Speaker 1: tragic irony to his final hours.
Speaker 2: Yeah, he was already in a state of mourning.
Speaker 1: Right. He was dressed for a solemn occasion, grappling with
Speaker 1: the loss of a friend, and on that very same day,
Speaker 1: he basically shares their fate.
Speaker 2: But here's the thing. When the police agree with the
Speaker 2: family that he was likely murdered, what could they actually
Speaker 2: do about it in 1988?
Speaker 1: I mean, very little, unfortunately. And that is the paralyzing
Speaker 1: reality of policing in that era.
Speaker 2: Suspicion is basically just a hypothesis.
Speaker 1: Right. Without a crime scene, without a drop of blood,
Speaker 1: without a witness.
Speaker 2: And without a body. Yeah.
Speaker 1: You have absolutely nothing to process. Like in 1988, there
Speaker 1: were no cell phones pinging off local towers.
Speaker 2: You couldn't just pull up a radius of his last
Speaker 2: known location.
Speaker 1: There were no CCTV cameras on every street corner or
Speaker 1: ATM vestibule to track his movements.
Speaker 2: Digital footprints just didn't exist.
Speaker 1: So they were entirely reliant on the physical description of
Speaker 1: what he was wearing.
Speaker 2: Precisely. That physical description becomes the entire foundation of the investigation.
Speaker 1: It's literally the only net they can cast.
Speaker 2: Right. And the missing persons report notes that he was
Speaker 2: wearing a white shirt trimmed with blue and a pair
Speaker 2: of plaid pants.
Speaker 1: Plaid pants. It's so specific.
Speaker 2: It is. And in the absence of the actual person,
Speaker 2: that hyper-specific outfit essentially becomes a proxy for Bryant Keith Bates.
Speaker 1: The police distribute that description via teletype. They print it
Speaker 1: on physical flyers.
Speaker 2: And they just ask troll officers to keep their eyes
Speaker 2: peeled for plaid pants and a blue trimmed shirt.
Speaker 1: It's like the clothing becomes a uniform for the missing.
Speaker 1: You just pray someone remembers seeing that specific pattern of plaid.
Speaker 2: But nobody did. No.
Speaker 1: For 16 long, agonizing years, the Bates family had nothing
Speaker 1: but that mental image of his final outfit.
Speaker 2: Their world was effectively paused on that one frozen frame
Speaker 2: of him walking out the door.
Speaker 1: Well, the rest of the world just moved on. The
Speaker 1: 80s turned into the 90s, the millennium turned over, and
Speaker 1: they were still trapped in November 1988.
Speaker 2: Until a Tuesday morning in 2004.
Speaker 1: Yeah, when the story finally unpauses in, well, The most
Speaker 1: gruesome way imaginable.
Speaker 2: This brings us to the discovery phase. It's November 22nd, 2004.
Speaker 1: We are still in Birmingham, Alabama, but we have shifted neighborhoods.
Speaker 2: Right. We are now in Southeast Lake.
Speaker 1: Which is close to where he disappeared, right? Because he
Speaker 1: lived in Northeast Lake.
Speaker 2: Very close. What's fascinating here is the geography. It's critical
Speaker 2: because it tells a story of proximity.
Speaker 1: He didn't vanish across state lines.
Speaker 2: No, he wasn't taken on a long cross-country journey. He
Speaker 2: was kept incredibly close to his own neighborhood this entire time.
Speaker 1: And he was hidden so well that it took an exterminator.
Speaker 2: Right, just performing a completely mundane, routine morning service call
Speaker 2: at a rental home.
Speaker 1: Just doing his everyday job, and he breaks the case open.
Speaker 2: The exterminator is navigating the crawlspace beneath this house, and
Speaker 2: he just stumbles upon a human skeleton.
Speaker 1: Just right there.
Speaker 2: The remains were concealed inside an old coal bin located
Speaker 2: within that crawlspace.
Speaker 1: Okay, I have to stop here. Because I am stuck
Speaker 1: on the logistics of this.
Speaker 2: It's a lot to process.
Speaker 1: My brain refuses to accept how this happens. Can you
Speaker 1: explain the architecture here?
Speaker 2: Sure.
Speaker 1: Because I'm picturing a modern basement. And I don't understand
Speaker 1: how a body sits under a residential home where people
Speaker 1: are actively living for 16 years.
Speaker 2: Right. Without anyone noticing. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Without a single person noticing a smell or without another
Speaker 1: maintenance worker finding it sooner.
Speaker 2: Well, to understand the logistics, you have to look at
Speaker 2: the historical architecture of older homes, particularly in the American South.
Speaker 1: Okay.
Speaker 2: A crawl space is not a basement. It's a shallow,
Speaker 2: unfinished area between the dirt ground and the first floor
Speaker 2: of the house.
Speaker 1: Like you can't stand up in it.
Speaker 2: Exactly. It's often just a few feet high, mainly there
Speaker 2: to allow access to plumbing and wiring.
Speaker 1: Oh, I see.
Speaker 2: But specifically... A coal bin within that crawlspace is a
Speaker 2: relic of an entirely abandoned era of home heating.
Speaker 1: Right, from when people actually used coal furnaces.
Speaker 2: Yes. Before natural gas and electric heating became standard, coal
Speaker 2: would be delivered via a chute into these reinforced enclosed
Speaker 2: bins under the house.
Speaker 1: Okay, so they're built to hold dirty stuff.
Speaker 2: By the 1980s and certainly by 2004, these bins were
Speaker 2: totally obsolete.
Speaker 1: Nobody was using them. Nobody.
Speaker 2: They were dark, forgotten, enclosed structures designed to hold dirt
Speaker 2: and fuel. They were completely disconnected from the daily living
Speaker 2: areas of the house.
Speaker 1: So it's essentially a pre-made hidden tomb that nobody has
Speaker 1: reason to ever look inside.
Speaker 2: Exactly. It's like something out of an Edgar Allan Poe
Speaker 2: story just buried under the floorboards.
Speaker 1: Wow.
Speaker 2: And the environment of a coal bin is also somewhat
Speaker 2: isolated from the elements, which can impact how remains decompose,
Speaker 2: potentially minimizing the disruption to the tenants above.
Speaker 1: So there wouldn't necessarily be a massive odor in the
Speaker 1: living room.
Speaker 2: Right. Furthermore, a crawl space is a place of avoidance.
Speaker 2: Tenants do not go down there.
Speaker 1: I definitely wouldn't go down into a dark crawl space.
Speaker 2: Landlords only go down there if a pipe bursts. It
Speaker 2: is a space designed to be ignored.
Speaker 1: Okay, so if we reverse engineer the crime... based on
Speaker 1: that specific location. What does this tell us about the
Speaker 1: person who put him there?
Speaker 2: It implies a terrifying degree of local knowledge and access.
Speaker 1: Because you don't just randomly pick a crawl space.
Speaker 2: Exactly. You do not drag a body into the crawl
Speaker 2: space of a random residential house in the middle of
Speaker 2: the day.
Speaker 1: No way.
Speaker 2: It requires time, privacy, and opportunity. This suggests the killer
Speaker 2: likely had a direct connection to that specific property in 1980. Oh, wow.
Speaker 1: Like they lived there.
Speaker 2: Perhaps they lived there. Perhaps they were the landlord. Perhaps
Speaker 2: they were a contractor working on it while it was
Speaker 2: vacant between tenants.
Speaker 1: They knew the coal bin was there.
Speaker 2: Yes. They knew it was an obsolete space that no
Speaker 2: one would check, and they knew it would buy them
Speaker 2: time to escape detection.
Speaker 1: They simply couldn't have known it would buy them a
Speaker 1: full 16 years.
Speaker 2: Right. But finding a skeleton is only the first hurdle.
Speaker 2: An exterminator can find the bones, but they can't tell
Speaker 2: you whose bones they are.
Speaker 1: Exactly. That shifts the entire burden onto the medical and
Speaker 1: forensic professionals.
Speaker 2: And this brings us to the fascinating and often misunderstood
Speaker 2: process of reconstructing a human identity from what is left
Speaker 2: behind in the dirt.
Speaker 1: So the remains are carefully extracted and transported to the
Speaker 1: Jefferson County Coroner and Medical Examiner's office.
Speaker 2: And this is where we see a crucial division of
Speaker 2: scientific labor. The remains are inspected by two distinct types
Speaker 2: of specialists.
Speaker 1: Right. A forensic pathologist and a forensic anthropologist. Let's break
Speaker 1: those two roles down because I think a lot of
Speaker 1: people just assume the medical examiner does everything.
Speaker 2: That's a common misconception.
Speaker 1: What is the difference between what the pathologist is looking
Speaker 1: for versus the anthropologist?
Speaker 2: It is the difference between asking how someone died versus
Speaker 2: who they were in life.
Speaker 1: Okay.
Speaker 2: The forensic pathologist is a medical doctor. Their primary objective
Speaker 2: is to determine the cause and manner of death.
Speaker 1: Even with just a skeleton?
Speaker 2: Even with a skeletonized body, they are looking for trauma.
Speaker 2: They are examining the bones for signs of sharp force trauma,
Speaker 2: like knife nicks on the ribs.
Speaker 1: Or blunt force trauma.
Speaker 2: Exactly, like depressed fractures on the skull. In this specific case,
Speaker 2: the pathologist's findings were grim but unequivocal.
Speaker 1: They found a gunshot wound to the head.
Speaker 2: Yes.
Speaker 1: But how exactly do you determine a gunshot wound on
Speaker 1: a dry skull after 16 years? Like, how do you
Speaker 1: know it wasn't just crushed by a rock?
Speaker 2: Bone is a dynamic material, and it reacts to high-velocity
Speaker 2: impact in very specific, predictable ways.
Speaker 1: How so?
Speaker 2: When a bullet strikes a skull, it doesn't just punch
Speaker 2: a clean hole. It creates radiating fracture lines, much like
Speaker 2: a stone hitting a pane of glass.
Speaker 1: Oh, I see.
Speaker 2: Furthermore, the pathologist looks for something called beveling.
Speaker 1: Beveling.
Speaker 2: Yeah. When a bullet enters the skull, the hole on
Speaker 2: the outer table of the bone is smaller and cleaner,
Speaker 2: but as it pushes through the bone, it blasts out
Speaker 2: a cone-shaped crater on the inside of the skull.
Speaker 1: Like it blows out the back.
Speaker 2: Exactly. That is called internal beveling, and it proves the
Speaker 2: trajectory was inward.
Speaker 1: And if there's an exit wound?
Speaker 2: The opposite happens. External beveling. By reading these fractures and craters,
Speaker 2: the pathologist can definitively state that this person was shot.
Speaker 1: Declaring the manner of death a homicide.
Speaker 2: Yes. But they still have a John Doe on the table.
Speaker 1: And this is where the anthropologist steps in to answer
Speaker 1: the who. Yes.
Speaker 2: A forensic anthropologist does not typically determine the cause of death.
Speaker 2: Their expertise is in osteology, the study of bones. Their
Speaker 2: job is to extract a biological profile from the skeleton.
Speaker 2: They want to determine the deceased's age at the time
Speaker 2: of death, their biological sex, their living stature or height,
Speaker 2: and their ancestral background.
Speaker 1: I have always wondered about the actual mechanics of this.
Speaker 1: How do you measure a pile of bones on a
Speaker 1: table and confidently say, this person was 5 foot 10
Speaker 1: inches tall?
Speaker 2: It relies on decades of anatomical data and mathematical regression formulas.
Speaker 1: Okay, math.
Speaker 2: The most reliable way to determine stature is by measuring
Speaker 2: the long bones of the legs, specifically the femur or
Speaker 2: thigh bone, And the tibia, the shin bone.
Speaker 1: Because they make up most of your height.
Speaker 2: Exactly. These bones correlate very closely with a person's overall height.
Speaker 2: The anthropologist uses a specialized tool called an osteometric board
Speaker 2: to get a precise measurement of the femur down to
Speaker 2: the millimeter.
Speaker 1: Wow, down to the millimeter.
Speaker 2: Yes. They then plug that measurement into a formula that
Speaker 2: accounts for sex and ancestry, and it yields an estimated
Speaker 2: height range. Wow. And in this case, they pinpointed the
Speaker 2: height at approximately 5'10.
Speaker 1: That is incredible. And what about age and ancestry? How
Speaker 1: do you read that from a 16-year-old skeleton?
Speaker 2: Age is determined by looking at growth and degeneration. For
Speaker 2: a young adult, the anthropologist looks at epiphyseal fusion.
Speaker 1: Which is what exactly?
Speaker 2: Essentially, whether the ends of the bones have fully fused
Speaker 2: to the shafts. This happens at very predictable ages as
Speaker 2: we grow up.
Speaker 1: Oh, like growth plates closing.
Speaker 2: Precisely. They also look at the cubic symphysis, the joint
Speaker 2: where the two halves of the pelvis meet.
Speaker 1: And what does that tell them?
Speaker 2: The surface of that joint changes from billowy and ridged
Speaker 2: in youth to flat and pitted in older adulthood.
Speaker 1: Oh, wow. So it literally wears down.
Speaker 2: Exactly. Based on these markers, they estimated the victim was
Speaker 2: between 17 and 30 years old.
Speaker 1: And ancestry?
Speaker 2: As for ancestry, that is determined by examining the microscopic
Speaker 2: structure of the bone and, more commonly, the morphology of
Speaker 2: the skull.
Speaker 1: Like the shape of the face.
Speaker 2: Yes, particularly the mid-facial region, the nasal aperture, and the
Speaker 2: eye orbits, which vary statistically among different ancestral populations.
Speaker 1: So let's look at the profile the anthropologists build. They
Speaker 1: conclude they have an adult male of African descent, standing
Speaker 1: around 5'10, aged somewhere between 17 and 30.
Speaker 2: Which is an incredibly specific demographic box.
Speaker 1: It is. But the biology was only part of the story.
Speaker 1: The earth in that coal bin preserved more than just bone.
Speaker 2: They also recovered physical artifacts that survived the 16 years
Speaker 2: of decay.
Speaker 1: Here's where it gets really interesting, because this is the
Speaker 1: part of the story that makes you want to pull
Speaker 1: your hair out.
Speaker 2: Yeah, the clothing. Right.
Speaker 1: They find remnants of the clothing. They recover pieces of
Speaker 1: plaid pants. They find argyle socks. They recover a white
Speaker 1: shirt with blue trim.
Speaker 2: All highly specific.
Speaker 1: And they also find a yellow metal chain necklace and
Speaker 1: a Coca-Cola brand watch.
Speaker 2: Those artifacts are essentially a time capsule. They're deeply poignant
Speaker 2: cultural markers of the late 1980s.
Speaker 1: Exactly. A Coca-Cola watch is a massive pop culture identifier.
Speaker 1: Like Coca-Cola clothing and accessories were a huge trend, specifically
Speaker 1: in the mid to late 80s.
Speaker 2: It places the time of death almost perfectly.
Speaker 1: But look at the staggering, tragic irony of this moment
Speaker 1: in 2004. The medical examiner's office has a demographic profile
Speaker 1: that perfectly aligns with a 21-year-old missing person.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 1: And sitting on the evidence table right next to those
Speaker 1: bones are plaid pants... It really is. This has to
Speaker 1: be the moment they solve it. Right. Like, did this
Speaker 1: immediately set off alarm bells for the missing persons unit?
Speaker 1: You would desperately hope so. It seems so obvious to
Speaker 1: us looking at the complete timeline. Yeah.
Speaker 2: But it didn't set off alarm bells. They did not
Speaker 2: make the connection.
Speaker 1: Wait, really?
Speaker 2: Really. Bryant Keith Bates remained an unidentified John Doe.
Speaker 1: Who would have said even possible? Is this a failure
Speaker 1: of police communication? Does one hand just not know what
Speaker 1: the other hand is doing?
Speaker 2: It is easy to blame incompetence, but it is much
Speaker 2: more accurate to blame the structural limitations of the analog era.
Speaker 1: The paper files.
Speaker 2: It is a tragedy of paper files. You have to
Speaker 2: put yourself in the reality of municipal record keeping before
Speaker 2: the Internet was universally integrated into law enforcement.
Speaker 1: Walk me through what that actually looks like. Why didn't
Speaker 1: the file in 1988 talk to the file in 2004?
Speaker 2: Because in 1988, that missing person report for Bryant Keith
Speaker 2: Bates was quite literally a piece of paper.
Speaker 1: Just a type sheet.
Speaker 2: An officer typed it up, put it into a manila folder,
Speaker 2: and dropped it into a physical metal filing cabinet in
Speaker 2: a specific records room at the Birmingham Police Department.
Speaker 1: Okay, and then 16 years pass.
Speaker 2: Fast forward 16 years to 2004. The detectives who originally
Speaker 2: took that report in 1988 have likely retired, been promoted
Speaker 2: to different divisions, or just moved to different cities.
Speaker 1: So the institutional memory, like the actual human brains that
Speaker 1: remembered looking for plaid pants, are gone from the building.
Speaker 2: Precisely. Now, look at 2004. The exterminator finds the bones.
Speaker 2: The Jefferson County Coroner's Office generates a brand new... Physical
Speaker 2: John Doe file.
Speaker 1: In a different building.
Speaker 2: That file sits in a completely different building in a
Speaker 2: different filing cabinet under a different jurisdictional umbrella.
Speaker 1: Oh, man. So without a centralized, easily searchable, digitized database
Speaker 1: that allows a coroner in one building to just type,
Speaker 1: plaid pants.
Speaker 2: Right. And instantly search the historical missing persons reports of
Speaker 2: the police department across town.
Speaker 1: Those two paper files basically exist in parallel universes.
Speaker 2: Unless a veteran detective miraculously remembers a 16-year-old flyer and
Speaker 2: happens to be drinking coffee with the medical examiner on
Speaker 2: the exact day the John Doe file is open, the
Speaker 2: connection is lost.
Speaker 1: The puzzle pieces are right there on the table, but
Speaker 1: they are locked in different rooms.
Speaker 2: It's absolutely maddening.
Speaker 1: The analog system failed them completely. And because of that failure...
Speaker 1: The family is forced to wait even longer.
Speaker 2: Which brings us into the era where law enforcement finally
Speaker 2: begins to digitize these records.
Speaker 1: But as we're about to see, just having computers doesn't
Speaker 1: magically solve the problem if the technology hasn't matured.
Speaker 2: The case stalls again. The bones go into an evidence
Speaker 2: locker and we enter another massive period of silence.
Speaker 1: Another one.
Speaker 2: It takes over a decade after the body was found
Speaker 2: for the next procedural step to happen.
Speaker 1: Decade.
Speaker 2: It's not until November of 2015 that the unidentified remains
Speaker 2: of Arjondo are finally entered into the National Missing and
Speaker 2: Unidentified Persons System, which is commonly known in the forensic
Speaker 2: community as NAMIS.
Speaker 1: Wait, 2015? The exterminator found the body in 2004. Why
Speaker 1: on earth did it take 11 years just to type
Speaker 1: the details of his skeleton and his Coca-Cola watch into
Speaker 1: a computer system?
Speaker 2: Because the system itself had to be built and then populated,
Speaker 2: which is a monumental administrative task.
Speaker 1: And NAMIUS wasn't around yet.
Speaker 2: NAMIUS is a remarkable national information clearinghouse and resource center
Speaker 2: for missing, unidentified, and unclaimed person cases across the U.S.
Speaker 2: But it didn't even launch its missing persons database until 2008.
Speaker 2: And the unidentified remains database followed shortly after. But here
Speaker 2: is the critical flaw in the system's early days. It
Speaker 2: wasn't automatically populated.
Speaker 1: Meaning someone had to manually do it.
Speaker 2: Yes. It required local jurisdictions, county coroners, understaffed police departments,
Speaker 2: overwhelmed medical examiners.
Speaker 1: Manually dig through their physical archives?
Speaker 2: Yes. Pull out decades of cold case manila folders and
Speaker 2: individually type the data into the new web portals.
Speaker 1: So it was essentially an unfunded mandate.
Speaker 2: Exactly.
Speaker 1: You have people whose full-time job is dealing with the
Speaker 1: fresh tragedies of today, and you are asking them to
Speaker 1: find hours in their week to digitize the tragedies of 1988.
Speaker 2: The backlog was, and honestly still is, astronomical. So it
Speaker 2: takes until 2015 for someone in Jefferson County to finally
Speaker 2: upload this specific John Doe profile into NAMOS.
Speaker 1: They enter the 5'10 height, the African descent, the 17
Speaker 1: to 30 age range, the plaid pants, the Coca-Cola watch.
Speaker 2: They cross their fingers, they hit the search button to
Speaker 2: see if it pings against any missing persons entered into
Speaker 2: the system, and it's nothing.
Speaker 1: They get zero matches. Because Brian Keith Bates' 1988 missing
Speaker 1: person file likely hadn't been digitized and uploaded into the
Speaker 1: missing person site of NAMUS yet.
Speaker 2: Right. The systems only work if both halves of the
Speaker 2: puzzle have been manually entered.
Speaker 1: This is so frustrating.
Speaker 2: So, frustrated by the database dead end, they wait a
Speaker 2: few more years and try a biological approach.
Speaker 1: Okay.
Speaker 2: In January of 2018... Investigators send a physical sample of
Speaker 2: the bone to the University of Texas Center for Human Identification.
Speaker 1: You refer to it as UNTCHI.
Speaker 2: They request traditional DNA analysis.
Speaker 1: Okay, before we talk about the results, explain the biology
Speaker 1: to me. Because the bone has been sitting in a
Speaker 1: dirt coal bin from 1988 to 2004. Right. And then
Speaker 1: sitting in an evidence box from 2004 to 2018. That
Speaker 1: is 30 years of degradation.
Speaker 2: That's a long time.
Speaker 1: How do scientists extract usable DNA from a dry 30-year-old bone?
Speaker 2: It is an incredibly delicate and rigorous scientific process because,
Speaker 2: as you needed, DNA degrades. In a living body, DNA
Speaker 2: is protected within our cells. Sure. But after death, the
Speaker 2: cells break down. Bacteria in the soil, moisture in the crawlspace,
Speaker 2: temperature fluctuations.
Speaker 1: All of that attacks the DNA.
Speaker 2: All of these factors attack and shred the long strands
Speaker 2: of DNA into tiny fragmented pieces.
Speaker 1: It's a wide bone.
Speaker 2: Bone is actually one of the best preservers of DNA
Speaker 2: because the hard calcium matrix acts like a microscopic vault,
Speaker 2: shielding the cells trapped inside.
Speaker 1: So how do they crack the vault?
Speaker 2: The forensic scientists at UNTCHI take a small section of
Speaker 2: the bone, usually from a dense area like the femur
Speaker 2: or a tooth, and they physically clean the exterior to
Speaker 2: remove any modern contamination. Then they freeze it using liquid
Speaker 2: nitrogen to make it incredibly brittle, and they pulverize it
Speaker 2: into a fine powder.
Speaker 1: Bone dust.
Speaker 2: Right. That bone powder is then treated with a series
Speaker 2: of harsh chemicals and enzymes. The goal is to decalcify
Speaker 2: the bone powder, breaking down the hard mineral structure, and
Speaker 2: then burst open the cellular membranes to release whatever fragmented
Speaker 2: DNA is left inside.
Speaker 1: Wow.
Speaker 2: They then use a chemical process to bind the DNA
Speaker 2: to a silica membrane, wash away all the burnt and calcium,
Speaker 2: and elute the purified DNA into a tiny vial of liquid.
Speaker 1: And from that tiny vial of liquid, they try to
Speaker 1: build a profile.
Speaker 2: Yes. They use a technique called polymerase chain reaction, or PCR.
Speaker 1: PCR, like the COVID test.
Speaker 2: Exactly the same principle. It acts like a biological photocopier.
Speaker 1: Okay, I see.
Speaker 2: It takes the tiny degraded fragments of DNA and copies
Speaker 2: them millions of times until there is a large enough
Speaker 2: sample for the machines to actually read.
Speaker 1: That is brilliant.
Speaker 2: In 2018, UNTCHI successfully performed this process. They developed a
Speaker 2: traditional male DNA profile from the bone powder, and they
Speaker 2: uploaded that profile into CODIS.
Speaker 1: ENCODIS is the Combined DNA Index System. It's the FBI's
Speaker 1: massive national DNA database that we hear about on literally
Speaker 1: every single true crime show.
Speaker 2: It is the gold standard for criminal justice DNA tracking
Speaker 2: in the United States.
Speaker 1: So they upload the John Doe's profile.
Speaker 2: The system runs its algorithms against millions of other DNA
Speaker 2: profiles and the result comes back. No match.
Speaker 1: Which just feels like a devastating blow. I mean, I
Speaker 1: want to push back on the cultural mythology of these
Speaker 1: databases here. Because I think pop culture has completely warped
Speaker 1: our understanding of how they actually work. Oh, absolutely. We
Speaker 1: watch police procedurals. We watch NCIS. And we're conditioned to
Speaker 1: believe that CODIS is this magical crystal ball. Like the
Speaker 1: lab technician in the white coat hits a dramatic red button.
Speaker 1: Green numbers cascade down a computer screen.
Speaker 2: And boom, a photograph of the killer or the victim
Speaker 2: pops up alongside their home address and a list of
Speaker 2: known associates.
Speaker 1: Exactly. We think it's instant magic.
Speaker 2: The television version of forensic science, what we often call
Speaker 2: the CSI effect, has created wildly unrealistic expectations for both
Speaker 2: the public and sometimes even for juries.
Speaker 1: So if CODIS isn't a crystal ball, what is a
Speaker 1: better analogy for how it actually functions? Because clearly putting
Speaker 1: the DNA in didn't solve the case in 2018.
Speaker 2: Think of CODIS not as a search engine, but as
Speaker 2: a massive, highly secured electronic filing cabinet.
Speaker 1: Okay, a filing cabinet.
Speaker 2: Traditional DNA testing looks at very specific targeted locations on
Speaker 2: the human genome called short tandem repeats or STRs.
Speaker 1: STRs, got it.
Speaker 2: CODIS typically looks at about 20 of these core loci.
Speaker 2: The machine generates a string of numbers representing the genetic
Speaker 2: markers at those 20 locations.
Speaker 1: So it's a very specific string of numbers.
Speaker 2: It is highly effective for proving identity. It can say,
Speaker 2: with statistical certainty, the blood at this crime scene belongs
Speaker 2: to John Smith.
Speaker 1: But only if John Smith's file is already in the cabinet.
Speaker 2: Exactly. That is the fundamental limitation. Traditional DNA testing and
Speaker 2: CODIS operate entirely on the premise of a direct one-to-one match.
Speaker 1: You have to already be in the system.
Speaker 2: For CODIS to give you a name, the person whose
Speaker 2: DNA you submitted must already have their genetic profile stored
Speaker 2: in that specific system.
Speaker 1: And how do you even get into CODIS in the
Speaker 1: first place?
Speaker 2: Usually it requires a prior felony criminal conviction where a
Speaker 2: swab was taken upon arrest. Alternatively, an immediate family member
Speaker 2: of a missing person might have voluntarily submitted a swab
Speaker 2: to a specific missing person's index within CODIS.
Speaker 1: So if Brian Keith Bates had never committed a felony
Speaker 1: before 1988, his DNA wouldn't be in the system.
Speaker 2: Correct.
Speaker 1: And if his family hadn't known to provide a DNA
Speaker 1: swab to the specific missing person's index by 2018, their
Speaker 1: DNA wouldn't be in there either.
Speaker 2: Also correct.
Speaker 1: So when investigators upload the bone profile in 2018... They're
Speaker 1: essentially just aggressively rummaging through an empty drawer in that
Speaker 1: filing cabinet.
Speaker 2: That is the perfect way to visualize it. CODIS is
Speaker 2: blind to anyone who hasn't already interacted with the criminal
Speaker 2: justice system or the missing persons database.
Speaker 1: It can't tell you who someone is from scratch.
Speaker 2: Right. It cannot tell you who a person is. It
Speaker 2: can only definitively tell you who they are not.
Speaker 1: Put yourself in the shoes of the Birmingham cold case
Speaker 1: detectives in 2018. You are using what is billed as
Speaker 1: the most cutting-edge 21st century technology available to law enforcement. Yeah.
Speaker 1: You have successfully extracted a DNA profile from a murder
Speaker 1: victim whose bones sat in a coal bin for 16 years.
Speaker 2: A huge scientific feat on its own.
Speaker 1: You have the full weight of the FBI's national database
Speaker 1: behind you, and you still hit an absolutely impenetrable brick wall.
Speaker 1: You are no closer to his identity than the exterminator
Speaker 1: was in 2004.
Speaker 2: It had to be profoundly demoralizing.
Speaker 1: The limits of CODIS in 2018... perfectly illustrate how traditional
Speaker 1: forensic science had hit a technological ceiling.
Speaker 2: They had pushed the direct match STR DNA technology as
Speaker 2: far as it could possibly go, and it wasn't enough.
Speaker 1: They needed something else.
Speaker 2: They needed a completely new paradigm. They needed a different
Speaker 2: way of interrogating the DNA. They needed the DNA to
Speaker 2: tell a broader story than just a direct identity.
Speaker 1: Which sets the stage beautifully for the true hero of
Speaker 1: this entire narrative. And honestly, what is becoming the defining
Speaker 1: forensic breakthrough of our generation?
Speaker 2: We are moving forward to the years 2025 and 2026.
Speaker 1: And the entrance of a process called forensic genetic genealogy
Speaker 1: or FGG.
Speaker 2: This is where the entire landscape of criminal investigations shifts
Speaker 2: on its axis. In March of 2025, investigators decide to
Speaker 2: try this new paradigm.
Speaker 1: OK, so what do they do?
Speaker 2: They take another bone sample from the John Doe. and
Speaker 2: submit it to a private laboratory based in Texas called Othram, Inc.
Speaker 1: Okay, Othram.
Speaker 2: Now, Othram does not do traditional CODIS testing. They specialize
Speaker 2: exclusively in forensic genetic genealogy for law enforcement.
Speaker 1: So what happens at Othram? How is it different?
Speaker 2: The scientists at Othram manage to extract DNA once again,
Speaker 2: but they use a completely different sequencing technology. They develop
Speaker 2: a comprehensive genealogical DNA profile.
Speaker 1: Okay.
Speaker 2: This new profile confirms the previous anthropological finding of African descent,
Speaker 2: but more importantly... Authron's in-house genetic genealogists use this complex
Speaker 2: new profile to develop fresh investigative leads.
Speaker 1: They aren't looking for a direct match anymore.
Speaker 2: No, they're looking for the victim's distant family tree.
Speaker 1: Okay, if CODIS is a filing cabinet looking for an
Speaker 1: exact matching file, what is the mechanism behind FGG? How
Speaker 1: does Authron's test do what the FBI's test couldn't do
Speaker 1: just seven years earlier? Explain the biological difference to me.
Speaker 2: The difference lies in the volume of genetic data being analyzed.
Speaker 1: Volume.
Speaker 2: Remember, traditional CODIS testing looks at about 20 locations or
Speaker 2: loci on the DNA strand. It is a very narrow
Speaker 2: targeted look.
Speaker 1: Just 20 spots.
Speaker 2: Right. Forensic genetic genealogy, on the other hand, utilizes something
Speaker 2: called single nucleotide polymorphisms or SNPs. pronounced SNPs.
Speaker 1: Yes, got it.
Speaker 2: Instead of looking at 20 locations, SNP testing looks at
Speaker 2: hundreds of thousands of microscopic locations across the entire genome.
Speaker 1: Wow. That is a massive jump in data. Can you
Speaker 1: give me an ELI-5 and explain it like I'm 5 analogy?
Speaker 1: for the difference between loci and SMPs?
Speaker 2: Sure. Imagine you were trying to determine if two massive 1,000-page
Speaker 2: books are exactly the same.
Speaker 1: Okay.
Speaker 2: Traditional CODIS testing is like looking only at the table
Speaker 2: of contents and comparing the 20-chapter titles. I see. If
Speaker 2: the 20-chapter titles match perfectly, you know it's the exact
Speaker 2: same book. But if they don't match, you learn nothing else.
Speaker 2: You can't tell if the authors are related or if
Speaker 2: they wrote about similar topics. Right.
Speaker 1: It's totally binary, match or no match. Exactly. Exactly.
Speaker 2: S & T testing, however, is like scanning every single
Speaker 2: one of those 1,000 pages and looking at hundreds of
Speaker 2: thousands of individual words, punctuation marks, and specific typographical errors.
Speaker 1: Wow, that's incredibly detailed.
Speaker 2: By mapping all of those tiny, widespread details, you don't
Speaker 2: just see if the book is an exact copy. You
Speaker 2: can see if parts of the book were plagiarized from
Speaker 2: another source.
Speaker 1: Oh, does that make sense?
Speaker 2: You can see if the two books share a common editor.
Speaker 2: You can trace the lineage of the text. SNP testing
Speaker 2: paints a vastly more detailed, high-resolution genetic picture of a
Speaker 2: person's entire ancestral makeup.
Speaker 1: So traditional DNA is asking the database, are you in here?
Speaker 1: But FGG is asking a much wider, more expansive question,
Speaker 1: who are your cousins?
Speaker 2: Yes, and they ask that question in completely different databases.
Speaker 1: Right, because they can't use CODIS.
Speaker 2: OTHERM is not uploading this massive SNP profile into CODIS
Speaker 2: because CODIS isn't built to read SNPs.
Speaker 1: Where does it go then?
Speaker 2: They upload this data file into commercial direct-to-consumer genealogical databases,
Speaker 2: specifically ones that allow law enforcement searches like GEDmatch or FamilyTreatNA.
Speaker 1: The ones everyday people use.
Speaker 2: Exactly. These are databases where millions of everyday citizens have
Speaker 2: voluntarily spit into a tube and uploaded their DNA to
Speaker 2: learn about their family heritage or find lost relatives.
Speaker 1: It's like the Google Maps analogy we've talked about before.
Speaker 2: Right. I love that analogy.
Speaker 1: Traditional DNA is like typing an exact address into Google Maps.
Speaker 1: If the house isn't built yet, the map shows you
Speaker 1: empty space.
Speaker 2: And FGG.
Speaker 1: FGG is like dropping a pin anywhere in the general neighborhood,
Speaker 1: looking at the surrounding streets, finding the names of the neighbors,
Speaker 1: and using them to triangulate where the missing house should be.
Speaker 2: That triangulation is the core of genetic genealogy. The genealogist
Speaker 2: uploads the John Doe's profile, and the system measures shared
Speaker 2: DNA using a unit called centimorgans. The higher the shared centimorgans,
Speaker 2: the closer the relationship. They aren't going to find the
Speaker 2: victim in there, but they might find a user who
Speaker 2: shares enough centimorgans to be a second cousin.
Speaker 1: Or a third cousin once removed.
Speaker 2: Exactly. Once they identify those distant relatives, the molecular biology
Speaker 2: essentially stops and the historical archival sleuthing begins.
Speaker 1: This is the part that fascinates me the most. Picture
Speaker 1: the genealogists sitting at their desk at Othram.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: They have stepped away from the test tubes and the
Speaker 1: genetic sequencers. What are they actually doing on their computer
Speaker 1: all day?
Speaker 2: They are acting as digital historians.
Speaker 1: That's so cool.
Speaker 2: They take the names of those distant cousins identified in
Speaker 2: the database, and they begin aggressively scouring public records.
Speaker 1: Like what kind of records?
Speaker 2: They are reading through digitized census data from the 1930s
Speaker 2: and 1940s. They are pulling marriage certificates, birth records, property deeds.
Speaker 2: and local newspaper obituaries.
Speaker 1: Just putting together the puzzle.
Speaker 2: They use all of this public data to build massive,
Speaker 2: sprawling family trees backward in time. They trace the lineages
Speaker 2: of those distant cousins up through history until they find
Speaker 2: the common ancestors.
Speaker 1: Perhaps a set of great-grandparents who lived in Alabama in
Speaker 1: the early 1900s.
Speaker 2: Precisely.
Speaker 1: And once they find that apex of the tree, those
Speaker 1: common great-grandparents... They reverse direction.
Speaker 2: Correct. They start building the family tree back down toward
Speaker 2: the present day. They map out every child, every grandchild,
Speaker 2: and every great-grandchild of those common ancestors.
Speaker 1: They are essentially reconstructing the entire modern family network.
Speaker 2: And as they build this massive web down into the
Speaker 2: 1970s and 1980s, they are looking for a very specific anomaly.
Speaker 1: A missing leaf.
Speaker 2: They are looking for a branch on the tree that
Speaker 2: is missing a leaf. They are looking for a young
Speaker 2: male of African descent, born in the late 1960s, who
Speaker 2: seemingly vanished from public records around 1988.
Speaker 1: It is an absolute masterclass in marrying modern biology with
Speaker 1: archival history. And the incredible thing is, this painstaking process
Speaker 1: actually worked.
Speaker 2: It did. Othram's genealogists generated the lead.
Speaker 1: They handed that family tree back to the Jefferson County
Speaker 1: coroner's office.
Speaker 2: And the local investigators follow the branches right to the
Speaker 2: surviving family of Bryant Keith Bates.
Speaker 1: Which culminates in one of the most profoundly emotional moments
Speaker 1: in any cold case investigation. The notification.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: I want you, the listener, to just stop and put
Speaker 1: yourself in the shoes of the Bates family for a second.
Speaker 1: It is late 2025, maybe early 2026.
Speaker 2: You are just going about your daily life. Right.
Speaker 1: You're going to work. You're buying groceries. It had been
Speaker 1: 38 years since your son or your brother walked out
Speaker 1: the front door wearing a white shirt and plaid pants
Speaker 1: to go to a friend's funeral.
Speaker 2: 38 years. That is 38 missed birthdays. 38 Christmases, 38
Speaker 2: years of waking up and wondering if today is the
Speaker 2: day he walks back in. The grief is probably calloused over,
Speaker 2: but the question is always there.
Speaker 1: Always.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: And then there's a knock on your door. A detective
Speaker 1: is standing on your porch holding a file and they say,
Speaker 1: we found him.
Speaker 2: The sheer emotional weight of that moment is staggering.
Speaker 1: The fact that a microscopic biological sample pulled from a
Speaker 1: bone sitting in a dusty coal bin.
Speaker 2: It was effectively crowdsourced through the digitized family trees of
Speaker 2: modern strangers. To finally give this family an answer.
Speaker 1: It is nothing short of miraculous.
Speaker 2: It is the ultimate vindication of science serving humanity.
Speaker 1: Absolutely.
Speaker 2: To finalize the process, in February of 2026, the investigators
Speaker 2: took a new direct DNA swab from the immediate family members.
Speaker 1: Just to be absolutely sure.
Speaker 2: They sent it back to UNTCHI to perform a traditional
Speaker 2: STR DNA test against the bone sample. And this time,
Speaker 2: because the direct relatives were in the system, it was
Speaker 2: a definitive, undeniable match.
Speaker 1: The 38-year mystery of the John Doe in the crawlspace
Speaker 1: was closed.
Speaker 2: Bryant Keith Bates finally got his name back.
Speaker 1: It is a monumental, hard-fought victory. But one of the
Speaker 1: things that makes this specific deep dive so compelling is
Speaker 1: how the original local news source presented this story.
Speaker 2: This is a really important point. Right.
Speaker 1: Because when ABC 3340 published Hannah Bazinow's article in February 2026,
Speaker 1: they didn't present this case in a vacuum.
Speaker 2: No, they didn't. They placed this incredible scientific triumph right
Speaker 2: in the middle of a very chaotic, very busy local reality.
Speaker 1: And that brings us to the ripple effect of this
Speaker 1: technology and the broader capistry of the justice system surrounding it.
Speaker 2: The broader context is crucial because it highlights why efficiency
Speaker 2: in forensic science is so desperately needed. The article notes
Speaker 2: a vital statistic.
Speaker 1: What was it?
Speaker 2: The identification of Bryant Keith Bates is only the second
Speaker 2: positive DNA match utilizing forensic genetic genealogy in this specific jurisdiction.
Speaker 1: Only the second?
Speaker 2: Yes, but the very next sentence is the kicker. There
Speaker 2: are 26 more cold cases currently in the pipeline, actively
Speaker 2: being analyzed through this exact same FGG process.
Speaker 1: Think about the math on that. 26 pending cases. If
Speaker 1: it took 38 years of suffering to resolve just one case...
Speaker 1: Clearing 26 cases isn't just an administrative victory of closing
Speaker 1: old files.
Speaker 2: No, you are talking about addressing literal centuries of collective,
Speaker 2: unresolved trauma.
Speaker 1: You are talking about lifting a dark, suffocating cloud off
Speaker 1: of dozens of local families who would resign themselves to
Speaker 1: the belief that society had forgotten their loved ones.
Speaker 2: FGG is systematically emptying the crawlspaces of history.
Speaker 1: Oh, that's a powerful way to say it. emptying the
Speaker 1: crawl spaces.
Speaker 2: It represents a tectonic structural shift in how justice can operate.
Speaker 2: But as you mentioned, the publisher surrounded this profound story
Speaker 2: with a sidebar of other trending local news from that
Speaker 2: specific week in August of 2026. Let's talk about that sidebar.
Speaker 2: Analyzing it provides a fascinating, almost jarring look at the
Speaker 2: ecosystem in which these detectives are operating.
Speaker 1: It's wild to look at the contrast. So what does
Speaker 1: this all mean? What else was happening in Alabama while
Speaker 1: they were solving a four decade old murder?
Speaker 2: Well, you look at the headlines the source provided.
Speaker 1: You have a massive story about the Tuscaloosa police and
Speaker 1: the FBI executing a coordinated operation that resulted in 90
Speaker 1: arrests and the recovery of 10 illegal firearms.
Speaker 2: That is a massive expenditure of manpower and resources.
Speaker 1: Right. Then you scroll down and see a story about
Speaker 1: the courts upholding a death sentence for a man convicted
Speaker 1: of a double murder in Talladega County that happened all
Speaker 1: the way back in 2001. Still litigating it 25 years later.
Speaker 2: And then....
Speaker 1: You see a horrific, tragic headline about two people being
Speaker 1: criminally charged in the fentanyl overdose death of a 10-month-old baby.
Speaker 2: Heartbreaking.
Speaker 1: When you put all of those pieces together, what is
Speaker 1: the picture it paints of the modern justice system?
Speaker 2: It paints a picture of a system that is drowning.
Speaker 1: Drowning in work.
Speaker 2: It is heavily burdened, chaotic, and operating at absolute maximum capacity.
Speaker 2: Police forces and district attorneys are managing massive multi-agency sweeps,
Speaker 2: netting 90 arrests.
Speaker 1: They are navigating the horrific modern epidemic of opioid overdoses
Speaker 1: involving infants.
Speaker 2: And simultaneously, the appellate courts are still bogged down litigating
Speaker 2: death penalty cases from a quarter of a century ago.
Speaker 1: The machinery of justice is desperately trying to keep its
Speaker 1: head above the water of present day crime.
Speaker 2: Which makes the resolution of a 1988 cold case seem
Speaker 2: almost impossible.
Speaker 1: In a system that overwhelmed, old cases get buried under
Speaker 1: the avalanche of the new. The detectives simply do not
Speaker 1: have the thousands of hours of shoe leather required to
Speaker 1: manually reinvestigate a 38-year-old file.
Speaker 2: But FGG emerges here as a beacon of incredible efficiency.
Speaker 2: It is a technological tool that cuts straight through the backlog.
Speaker 1: It does the heavy lifting in a lab in Texas.
Speaker 2: Exactly. Allowing local police to focus on the crisis of
Speaker 2: the day without abandoning the victims of the past.
Speaker 1: That is the administrative value of the science. But then
Speaker 1: you look at the other side of that new sidebar,
Speaker 1: the completely mundane civic updates, and it adds a profound
Speaker 1: philosophical layer to the story.
Speaker 2: The juxtaposition is staggering.
Speaker 1: Yes. You have this sweeping multi-generational epic of a 38-year-old
Speaker 1: murder finally being solved through cutting-edge genetics. And right next
Speaker 1: to it, on the exact same digital page, there is
Speaker 1: breaking news about an SUV accidentally crashing through the glass
Speaker 1: doors of a pool supply store called Swimrite in Rocky
Speaker 1: Ridge Plaza.
Speaker 2: No injuries, just broken glass and chlorine.
Speaker 1: Right. And below that, there's an article patiently explaining the
Speaker 1: engineering reasons why bridge repairs in the town of Calera
Speaker 1: require more than just patching the concrete.
Speaker 2: Just everyday civic maintenance.
Speaker 1: Then there's a civic update urging residents of Cullman to
Speaker 1: prepare for Bowes Law. A new regulation concerning dog ownership.
Speaker 2: And finally, a business piece announcing the opening of a
Speaker 2: second medical cannabis dispensary in Talladega.
Speaker 1: It creates a perfectly preserved cross-section of human existence in 2026.
Speaker 2: You have profound, earth-shattering tragedy alongside the most completely ordinary, mundane,
Speaker 2: civic life all happening simultaneously on the same Tuesday.
Speaker 1: It really hits you. Think back to our opening thought.
Speaker 1: While the Bates family's entire emotional world was paralyzed by
Speaker 1: that unanswered question in 1988, the rest of the world
Speaker 1: just stubbornly kept turning.
Speaker 2: Kept turning.
Speaker 1: For 38 years, people kept buying pool supplies. Civic engineers
Speaker 1: kept repairing bridges. City councils argued about dog leash laws
Speaker 1: and zoned commercial real estate for cannabis dispensaries.
Speaker 2: The relentless mundane machinery of human society never stops moving forward.
Speaker 1: Even when an individual's life is tragically paused and buried
Speaker 1: in a coal bin.
Speaker 2: The world is indifferent to our personal tragedies, and I
Speaker 2: think that inherent indifference is exactly why the resolution of
Speaker 2: these cold cases resonates so deeply with the public consciousness.
Speaker 1: Because it defies that indifference.
Speaker 2: Yes. The application of forensic genetic genealogy is a deliberate
Speaker 2: interruption of that mundane machinery. It is a moment where society,
Speaker 2: through the proxy of these dedicated scientists and investigators, collectively
Speaker 2: stops and says, no, we haven't forgotten you.
Speaker 1: The exterminator doing his grimy morning job. the anthropologists meticulously
Speaker 1: measuring a femur bone with calipers, the genealogists drinking coffee
Speaker 1: while clicking through 1940 census records.
Speaker 2: They all represent a society that absolutely refuses to let
Speaker 2: the past simply vanish.
Speaker 1: It is a powerful thought, and it beautifully synthesizes the
Speaker 1: incredible journey we've taken today.
Speaker 2: It really does.
Speaker 1: Let's look back at the ground we've covered. We started
Speaker 1: in 1988 with a 21-year-old young man wearing plaid pants
Speaker 1: and a Coca-Cola watch disappearing into the ether on his
Speaker 1: way to a funeral.
Speaker 2: We moved through an agonizingly silent 16 years.
Speaker 1: Ending with a grim, shocking discovery beneath the floorboards of
Speaker 1: a rental home in 2004.
Speaker 2: We watched as the analog system of paper manila folders
Speaker 2: failed him. And we saw how early digital databases like
Speaker 2: Namu's and Codeus were fundamentally unequipped to make the connection.
Speaker 1: And finally, we witnessed the astonishing technological breakthrough of forensic
Speaker 1: genetic genealogy in 2025 and 2026. a science that mapped
Speaker 1: hundreds of thousands of genetic markers, reached backward through a
Speaker 1: century of public records, and finally gave Brian Keith Bates
Speaker 1: his name back.
Speaker 2: It is a testament to the sheer persistence of memory
Speaker 2: and the refusal of science to accept a dead end.
Speaker 1: But as we wrap up this analysis, the mechanics of
Speaker 1: this breakthrough raise a massive, lingering philosophical question.
Speaker 2: I want you, the listener, to deeply consider the implications
Speaker 2: of where this technology is heading. We are watching forensic
Speaker 2: genetic genealogy transition from a novel experimental last resort into
Speaker 2: standard law enforcement operating procedure.
Speaker 1: We just saw that one county in Alabama has 26
Speaker 1: more cases in the pipeline right now.
Speaker 2: If our DNA connects us all in this inescapable, highly
Speaker 2: digitized web of family trees, are we entering an era
Speaker 2: where anonymity and death might actually become scientifically impossible? Wow.
Speaker 1: That is heavy.
Speaker 2: Are we witnessing the literal permanent end of the cold
Speaker 2: case forever?
Speaker 1: If the science dictates that every single unknown person, no
Speaker 1: matter how degraded their bones are, can eventually be linked
Speaker 1: back to a distant cousin.
Speaker 2: Triangulated through a census record.
Speaker 1: And reattached to their family name, then the ghosts of
Speaker 1: the past are finally irrevocably running out of places to hide.
Speaker 2: That is exactly the reality we are moving toward.
Speaker 1: That is a thought that will stick with me for
Speaker 1: a very long time. The idea that anonymity itself, the
Speaker 1: concept of dying unknown, might become extinct.
Speaker 2: It's a brand new world.
Speaker 1: It brings us right back to the beginning of our
Speaker 1: deep dive. For 38 years, the diagnostic tools of the
Speaker 1: justice system were completely broken. The waters were hopelessly suffocatingly murky.
Speaker 2: But finally, after decades of waiting in the dark, the
Speaker 2: science caught up to the tragedy.
Speaker 1: The genetic map cleared the waters, and the truth was
Speaker 1: right there, visible for everyone to see. Thanks for joining
Speaker 1: us on the deep dive. We'll catch you next time.