For more than 36 years, she was known only as a Jane Doe, a set of partial remains found down an embankment near Highway 33 and Creek Road in an unincorporated stretch of Ojai. Now investigators say she has a name: Patricia Diana Hunt Fielding, a mother of four born in Kern County in 1933. The identification, confirmed through DNA testing and genetic genealogy, closes a gap that opened on July 23, 1990, when firefighters responding to a traffic collision stumbled onto her remains.
A Discovery During a Routine Call
Fire Department personnel were assisting with a traffic collision when they discovered the remains down an embankment near Highway 33 and Creek Road, according to edhat.com. The Ventura County Sheriff’s Department Search and Rescue Team was called in afterward to comb the area for additional evidence, while the Ventura County Medical Examiner’s Office recovered what remained for examination. At the time, the Medical Examiner estimated the remains belonged to a woman between 30 and 60 years old, standing roughly 5 feet 3 inches to 5 feet 6 inches tall, according to KTLA.
Her cause and manner of death could not be determined, and her identity remained a mystery for decades despite investigators’ efforts. Case details were entered into both the Combined DNA Index System and the National Missing and Unidentified Persons System, and evidence was submitted to the California Department of Justice for DNA analysis, according to NBC Los Angeles. None of it produced a name — until the case found its way to a forensic DNA lab three and a half decades later.
A Breakthrough Through Genetic Genealogy
The turning point came in February 2025, when the sheriff’s Cold Case Unit and the Ventura County Medical Examiner’s Office partnered with forensic DNA company Othram to conduct advanced genetic testing, per KTLA’s reporting. Using forensic genetic genealogy, investigators developed new leads that eventually pointed them toward a family who had not heard from a relative in decades. Investigators obtained a DNA reference sample from that family and compared it with DNA drawn from the unidentified remains, resulting in a positive identification.
The comparison confirmed the remains belonged to Patricia Diana Hunt Fielding, born October 15, 1933, in Kern County, California, the station’s report notes. KTLA described Fielding as a 57-year-old mother of four from Taft, California; little is known about her life before her remains were discovered or the circumstances surrounding her death.
Another Highway 33 Case Resolved by DNA
Fielding’s identification is not the only cold case along that stretch of road to be cracked open by DNA science. Partial skeletal remains of an unidentified man were found by hikers near mile marker 43.5 of Highway 33 in February 1981, according to a separate KTLA report. Investigators created a partial DNA profile for the man in 2004, and later technological advances allowed them to locate his family, ultimately identifying him as Thomas Aquinas Cooney, a Vietnam War veteran and Bronze Star recipient. As with Fielding, officials said Cooney’s cause of death could not be determined and that very little was known about his life or death.
Forensic genetic genealogy, the method used in Fielding’s case, combines DNA analysis with traditional investigative techniques and has become a growing tool for law enforcement working through decades-old unidentified remains cases, according to the U.S. Department of Justice. For Ventura County, it has now turned up an answer in an Ojai-area mystery that sat unsolved for more than three decades.
Investigators Still Seeking Answers
Even with a name attached to the case, much about Patricia Diana Hunt Fielding’s final years remains unknown. The Ventura County Sheriff’s Office Cold Case Unit is asking anyone with information about Fielding or her whereabouts before July 23, 1990, to come forward, according to edhat.com. Tips can be directed to the unit at 805-383-8739 or [email protected].
