Decades-old human remains in 2 Franklin County cold cases identified

COLUMBUS, Ohio (WCMH) -- Two missing persons cold cases in Franklin County that each date back more than 15 years have had major breakthroughs.

According to a release from Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost's office, the Franklin County Coroner's Office has identified two missing people, one from 1992 and another from 2006, using advanced DNA technology.

The first case stemmed from police finding a man's body on Sept. 20, 1992, along Big Darby Creek near the 7000 block of Lockbourne Road. The man was found with a gunshot wound to the head and could not be positively identified for 30 years. Case records were digitized in 2019 which helped connect investigators to a DNA sample that was submitted in Queens, New York in 1993 of a set of parents that was comparable to that of the unidentified man.

With more advancements in DNA technology, the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation was able to obtain a DNA sample from the mother and positively identify the man as Chow Chan. Currently, this case remains an unsolved homicide.

The second missing person case that recently had a breakthrough was from 2006. On March 30, a man's body was found in the Scioto River with investigators unable to determine the cause of death. Like the 1992 case, the files for this case were digitized in 2019 which led the coroner's office to collaborate with the DNA Doe Project to identify the man.

The DNA Doe Project's use of "investigative genetic genealogy" was part of months of testing that soon pointed them toward the brother of the unidentified man. The DNA samples matched and law enforcement identified the man as Randy Raines. The attorney general's office did not say if this case is an unsolved homicide.