Particle.news
Download on the App Store

Toronto Police Identify Two Cold-Case Victims Using Genetic Genealogy

Investigative genetic genealogy restored names to two long-unidentified victims, offering answers to families despite limits on prosecuting suspects.

Overview

  • Police announced Monday that Investigative Genetic Genealogy was used to identify remains from a 1995 Danforth burial and a 2004 Highway 401 crash-fire.
  • The 1995 skeleton was named as Mary McLeod Moffat (née Davidson), with forensics showing at least six blunt-force head injuries and investigators concluding she was likely killed in April 1936.
  • Investigators named Moffat’s husband, Andrew Lloyd Moffat (also known as Drake Lloyd Cummings), as the primary suspect but said he died in 1985 and cannot be prosecuted.
  • The 2004 passenger was identified as Patsy Flora Lagarde, whose DNA linked her to Cree communities and the Fisher River Cree Nation, and whose death investigators say was concealed by a fire that the Office of the Fire Marshal found was set with gasoline.
  • Toronto police said both files were selected for genetic-genealogy work in 2022, required lengthy testing because of degraded DNA, and have allowed relatives and Indigenous communities to be notified while investigators finalize records for families.