The Oregon State Police’s Medical Examiner’s Office worked with multiple agencies to successfully identify remains found in 1979 as belonging to Freeman Asher Jr.
On Sept. 14, 1979, two hikers discovered the skeletal remains of an adult near the bottom of Multnomah Falls in Multnomah County, Oregon. Also recovered were items of degraded clothing, eyeglasses, and a hair mass indicating the individual may have been of African American biological origin. Examination of the remains in 1979 was completed by the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C., as Oregon did not have an anthropologist on staff to perform the examination.
The remains were re-inventoried in 2005 and re-examined in 2006. Anthropological analysis confirmed through cranial measurements that the deceased was most probably of African American heritage. In 2010, a sample of the remains was submitted to the University of North Texas, and a DNA profile was uploaded into the CODIS database. In 2013, Clackamas County forensic artist Joyce Nagy provided a 2D composite drawing, with personal items including a ball cap, to give law enforcement another tool to use in helping identify the deceased.
In 2018, Oregon State Police Medical Examiner’s Office was awarded an NIJ grant to perform innovative DNA techniques on unsolved unidentified skeletal remains cases. Because the DNA profile of the decedent had never hit to a missing person case in the CODIS database, and because the case was one of the oldest in Oregon’s Medical Examiner facility, it was recognized as one that could potentially be resolved by DNA phenotyping and investigative genetic genealogy provided by Parabon Nanolabs.
In 2020, Parabon Nanolabs delivered a DNA phenotyping and genetic genealogy report that listed a possible first and last name for the deceased, Freeman Isaac Asher, Jr. Asher had relatives in the Portland, Oregon area and was known to have moved to Portland sometime around 1976. A picture located on social media by the genetic genealogist revealed a family portrait at a social event, taken in the 1980’s, with the mother of Freeman and several offspring; after receiving the names of all siblings and relatives in the family and evaluating the image, the genealogist determined that Freeman Asher, Jr. was the only Asher sibling not in the photo.
Multnomah County Sheriff’s Office (as the lead agency for the unidentified person case) and Portland Police Bureau (as the lead agency for the missing person case) then conducted extensive interviews, searches, and data pursuits to locate Freeman Asher’s family. After moving to the Portland area, Asher disappeared and was assumed to be dead by most of his relatives. A sister in California agreed to oral swab standard collection; San Fernando Police Department was then contacted, and an officer there facilitated the collection of the oral swab standards for comparison to the DNA from the skeletal remains.
On Jan. 29, 2021, the Medical Examiner’s Office received a kinship inference report from Parabon Nanolabs stating that the skeletal remains and Freeman Asher’s sister shared 2,730.1 centimorgans of autosomal DNA. This amount and type of shared DNA is exclusively consistent with a full sibling relationship, and the identity of Freeman Isaac Asher, Jr. was corroborated through genetic means.
These cases may take decades to resolve, but they illuminate the true meaning of the words public safety professionals believe in, “never give up.” Through collaborations, research, examination and investigation by the State Medical Examiner’s Office, Smithsonian Institute, Clackamas County Sheriff's Office, Multnomah County Sheriff's Office, Portland Police Bureau, Parabon Nanolabs and San Fernando Police Department, we can now offer this man his dignity by providing him with his first and last name.
Republished courtesy of Oregon State Police. Photo credit: OSP