Body found more than 30 years ago ID’d as Indiana girl who went missing in 1978

Skeletal stays have been recognized as Tracy Sue Walker.
Texas Bureau of Investigation

The skeletal stays of a lady found in Tennessee greater than 30 years in the past have been recognized as a 15-year-old Indiana woman who went lacking within the Nineteen Seventies.

The unidentified physique investigators had known as “Child Lady” was matched to Tracy Sue Walker by DNA expertise, the Tennessee Bureau of Investigations introduced Tuesday.

Walker went lacking in 1978 from Lafayette, Indiana — practically 400 miles from the place her physique was found in Campbell County, Tennessee.

How she ended up throughout a number of state traces and the way she died stay a thriller, investigators stated.

Walker’s physique was discovered within the Large Wheel Hole space of Elk Valley on April 3, 1985, about seven years after she disappeared.

Forensic anthropologists have been unable to determine the physique, however confirmed the stays have been these of a white feminine, doubtless between the ages of 10 and 15 — which impressed investigators to affectionately name her “Child Lady.”

Greater than 20 years after the physique was recovered, investigators submitted a pattern of the stays to the College of North Texas Middle for Human Identification in hopes of studying who she was.

College scientists developed a DNA profile that was entered into the Mixed DNA Index System, in addition to the Nationwide Lacking and Unidentified Individuals System.

In 2013, a Tennessee Bureau of Investigations agent and intelligence analyst revisited the case, in search of any new leads that would discover out who Child Lady was.

Lastly — 9 years later — the investigators obtained a breakthrough within the case after sending a pattern of the woman’s stays to a personal lab that analyzes human DNA.

Scientists on the lab, Othram, carried out forensic genetic family tree testing and in June, discovered a attainable relative of the kid who shared an analogous DNA profile in Indiana.

Tennessee investigators recognized potential relations in Lafayette, Indiana, off the DNA intel. They reached out to 1 particular person, who confirmed that a member of the family went lacking from the world in 1978.

Along with the Lafayette police, the investigators obtained familial DNA requirements for attainable siblings of Child Lady and submitted them to the DNA database.

This week, the College of North Texas Middle for Human Identification confirmed that Child Lady was actually Walker.

Now, the Tennessee Bureau of Investigations is shifting its focus to studying what occurred to Walker.

The bureau is asking anybody with details about the case or data about people Walker was with earlier than her demise to name 1-800-TBI-FIND.