A decade after Kent Cross vanished from Madera County, investigators have finally put a name to human remains that sat unidentified for years in a remote stretch of the Sierra foothills. Cross was reported missing by his father in October 2016, and deputies who searched for him at the time turned up nothing. Four years later, in 2020, human remains were discovered near McLeod Flatt, north of Road 274 — but they couldn't be identified at the time.
According to YourCentralValley.com, the break in the case came this past July, when Madera County Sheriff's Office Crime Scene Specialist Daniella Romero submitted the remains to Othram, a private forensic laboratory, for re-examination. Using forensic genetic genealogy, Othram developed an investigative lead that pointed toward Cross. The California Department of Justice Bureau of Forensic Science then conducted additional DNA testing that confirmed the bones were his.
The remains themselves had a grim backstory even before anyone knew whose they were. As DNASolves detailed, hikers discovered a human skull near the McLeod Flatt trailhead on April 27, 2020. The remains were found near Willow Creek at the bottom of a gorge, roughly 1.5 miles from the trailhead off USFS Road 5S07Z.
A Place He Called His Happy Spot
Cross's family told investigators he frequently visited the McLeod Flatt area, which he considered his “happy place,” per the sheriff's office account relayed by the same outlet. That detail gives the discovery site an added layer of poignancy: the remains surfaced in a place Cross apparently returned to again and again before he disappeared. Despite the identification, the circumstances leading up to his death remain a mystery, the report notes.
Madera County deputies searched for Cross back in 2016 but came up empty, according to KMPH. That gap between his disappearance and the eventual discovery of remains four years later left the case cold for the better part of a decade, with no clear answers about what happened to him in between.
Part of a Growing DNA-Solving Trend
Cross's case is far from an isolated one. Per DNASolves, this marked the 93rd case in California in which investigators used Othram's technology to help identify a person. The lab's forensic genetic genealogy approach combines dense genetic marker testing with traditional genealogical research, a method increasingly used to crack cases involving degraded DNA or remains with no obvious reference samples, according to research published on pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov.
Similar breakthroughs have surfaced elsewhere in California in recent weeks. The Los Angeles Times reported that remains linked to Johnathan Raxa, a father of three who disappeared after his fishing vessel crashed in 1999, were identified decades later. The same publication also reported that two sets of human remains found in a remote area of Lancaster were recently linked to two separate missing-person cases. Other recent identifications, including a Jane Doe found near a Southern California highway solved after 36 years, as reported by KTLA, and remains found in Ojai in 1990 confirmed as Patricia Fielding by NBC Los Angeles, point to the same pattern of long-cold cases finally closing through advanced DNA work.
Sheriff's Office Still Seeking Answers
Even with Cross's identity confirmed, the Madera County Sheriff's Office is still trying to piece together what happened to him. The agency is asking anyone with information to call (559) 675-7770 or text “Tip MaderaSO” followed by a message to 888777. For a family notified in 2026 of the identification of remains discovered in 2020, the next question — how he died — remains unanswered.
