Kathy Sanders lost her grandsons Chase and Colton Smith in the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing, and three decades later she is still searching for answers about a piece of physical evidence that has never been fully explained: an unidentified leg pulled from the rubble. Sanders has filed a lawsuit against the state's chief medical examiner, seeking records, lab documentation and DNA testing results tied to the limb, which investigators believed belonged to another bombing victim but which has never been conclusively matched to anyone.
“I lost both of my grandchildren, Chase and Colton Smith,” Sanders said, according to KOCO, which first reported on the lawsuit. The station reports Sanders has spent the last few decades working to solve the mystery of the leg and wants the results of DNA testing that was performed on it. Chase, 3, and Colton, 2, died in the America's Kids Daycare, located on the second floor of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building, according to the Associated Press, which notes that 19 children died in the daycare and only six survived.
The April 19, 1995 bombing killed 168 people and injured more than 680 others, remaining the deadliest act of domestic terrorism in U.S. history, per the same Associated Press account. The mystery limb dates back to that year: it was discovered on May 30, 1995, six days after crews demolished what remained of the Murrah building, and more than a month after Levy's body had already been recovered, according to historical reporting from The Denver Post.
An Exhumation In New Orleans
The leg's origin became public in February 1996, when state officials acknowledged that 21-year-old Air Force Airman Lakesha Levy, who died in the bombing, had been buried in New Orleans with an unidentified left leg belonging to someone else, according to the Los Angeles Times. FBI DNA and footprint tests had matched a severed leg found in the rubble to Levy, prompting officials to exhume her body from a crypt after they realized the error. KOCO reports it traveled to New Orleans with the medical examiner in 1996 to cover that exhumation, and that another victim's remains were exhumed during the investigation as well.
Following the exhumation, state medical officials and federal authorities asserted the unmatched leg likely belonged to one of eight known bombing victims who had been buried without left legs, since the blast made body parts difficult to sort out precisely during the emergency response, the Denver Post reported at the time. Investigators thought the leg belonged to another victim, but the person connected to it has never been identified, according to KOCO.
The Leg's Legal History
The uncertainty did not stay confined to the medical examiner's office. During pre-trial proceedings in 1996, defense attorneys for Timothy McVeigh pointed to the unidentified leg to argue that an unrecovered co-conspirator — commonly referred to as “John Doe No. 2” — might have died in the explosion, the Denver Post reported. Years later, in 2004, former Chief Medical Examiner Dr. Fred Jordan publicly acknowledged that despite extensive reviews by forensic pathologists and anthropologists, officials could not definitively identify whom the leg belonged to or resolve whether it stemmed from administrative error or an unidentified person, according to a Tulsa World account.
Sanders has pressed the question for years. In March 2025 she published a book, “Shadows of Conspiracy: The Untold Story of the Oklahoma City Bombing,” documenting a 30-year independent investigation into government records, eyewitness reports and physical evidence surrounding her grandsons' deaths, according to Post Hill Press. In an unusual twist reported by WHYY, convicted co-conspirator Terry Nichols, who is serving life sentences in federal prison, sent Sanders letters urging her to pursue forensic genetic genealogy testing on the leg to determine its true origin.
What The Lawsuit Seeks
Per KOCO, Sanders hopes her lawsuit will produce documents related to the case, DNA testing results, lab records and the full medical examiner's office report. She said she would like to know who the unidentified person was. A letter from the medical examiner's office, cited by Sanders, said documentation is released only after an investigation concludes, and an attorney general's office letter — also per Sanders, dated June 2026 — classified the case as an open investigation.
That withholding rests on legal ground: under the Oklahoma Open Records Act, Title 51, Section 24A.5 et seq., public bodies may withhold law enforcement or medical examiner records if an active investigation or litigation is pending, according to Justia Law. Sanders' lawsuit seeks to compel disclosure despite that classification. KOCO reports it requested a statement on the lawsuit and the full report from the medical examiner's office, but as of publication the medical examiner's office had not responded to those requests.
