A young hitchhiker struck and killed on Interstate 40 in Oklahoma in 1972 was unidentified when buried, and for more than 50 years he stayed that way. Now an Oklahoma County judge has approved exhuming his remains for DNA testing.
STLtoday.com reported that an Oklahoma County judge approved the exhumation. The Oklahoma Highway Patrol reported that the young man stepped in front of a car in 1972 and was carrying no identification. He was buried at Resurrection Memorial Cemetery in Oklahoma City.
A Family's Decades-Long Search
James Charles Stanford disappeared after leaving his home in Overland, Missouri, telling family he planned to join a convent in Texas or California. He was never heard from again.
A relative of Stanford submitted DNA for comparison.
DNA Analysis
The University of North Texas Center for Human Identification provides forensic DNA analysis for skeletal remains and family reference samples.
A judge approved exhuming the body in Oklahoma County, clearing the way for DNA testing of the remains. The case has remained unresolved for more than five decades.
Dr. A. Jay Chapman became nationally known as the creator of the three-drug lethal injection protocol Oklahoma introduced in 1977, according to a Wikipedia profile of his career.
Missing-person researchers have noted that Stanford's sister may appear as a junior in a 1972 school yearbook, and accounts differ on the date he disappeared. The federal National Missing and Unidentified Persons System lists his date of last contact as May 1, 1971, and the date discrepancy has prompted discussion about a possible connection to the Oklahoma case on Reddit's r/UnresolvedMysteries.
Stanford's Missing-Person Case
The Overland Police Department lists Stanford as an endangered missing person. An age-progression image attributed to the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children shows how he might look at 64, circa 2018.
The Doe Network's case entry describes Stanford as 6 feet 3 inches tall and 125 pounds, with brown hair and green eyes, when he was last seen in Overland.
The broader scale of such cases is immense: NamUs lists more than 21,000 active missing-person records and nearly 14,000 active unidentified-person records, according to the National Institute of Justice. For one Overland family, DNA testing may bring an answer.
