CLEVELAND, Ohio - A recent John Doe case out of Akron has been solved in just weeks thanks to a new technique and the help of a common household item.Someone discovered human remains in the brush in the heart of the city, just outside of the University of Akron back in February.
Investigators couldn’t get fingerprints because of decomposition, so they sent his DNA samples to a BCI lab.Meanwhile, Jason Grom, a forensic death investigator, tried something new. “And anything with water on it, will you just it won’t read appropriately, you won’t get a nice clear print. But WD-40, being WD is water displacement, it takes away all the water. That way it can scan nicely,” he said.Two fingerprints, one from each hand, can get a hit from the databases if the person had a criminal history, identifying them in a minute or two.“I was proud of my work.