PUEBLO COUNTY, Colo. (KOAA) — A case that has been cold for nearly two and a half decades is one step closer to closure.
The Pueblo County Sheriff's Office says detectives have finally identified the remains of a man found north of Pueblo City Limits in 2000. The man has been identified as Marvin Majors, originally from Oklahoma.
Majors was 34 at the time of his suspected death. The sheriff's office says his body was discovered back in 2000 when a woman was walking her dog north of the Walking Stick development.
Despite extensive attempts to identify his skeletal remains at the time of discovery, no leads ever came through. In 2001, a sculptor from the University of Colorado was brought in to mock up the clay sculpture at the top of this article to attempt to identify the man.
The sculpture would turn up one lead from a rancher who identified the man as someone who had been camping on his property in August of 2000. At the time, the rancher told the sheriff's office the man had told him he was traveling from New Mexico to Denver.
In 2021, the Pueblo County Sheriff's Office revisited the case and learned that the FBI had completed a DNA profile of Majors' remains.
This, combined with a DNA sample of items in evidence found at the campsite, was sent to the CBI, and a new DNA sample was submitted to a genetic genealogy database in 2023.
In November 2024, that sample came back and matched a sample in the data set with a distant family member of Majors.
Detectives collected DNA from a suspect sibling of Majors, and that sample just came back the last week of June as a positive match. It was verified by a Forensic Investigative Genetic Genealogist, leading law enforcement to conclude that the man found was Marvin Majors.
The sheriff's office says distant family members of Majors said he grew up in Los Angeles, CA, and lived a transient lifestyle. Family members had not heard or seen Majors since 1998-1999 and had always wondered what had happened to Majors.
“Through modern science and teamwork, our detectives were able to get the breakthrough they needed to identify this person,” said Lucero. “The years of dedication, diligence, and perseverance by our detectives demonstrate that no matter how old a case is, they are committed to solving it. This was somebody’s family member, and our team went above and beyond to identify him and to bring some closure to his family.”
Majors' family expressed appreciation for the sheriff's office's work over the past two and a half decades and was thankful for bringing this case to a close. Majors' cause of death was never identified; however, the sheriff's office said that foul play was not suspected.
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