No longer cold: the 1999 murder of Marianne Vaatstra
The 1999 cold case of Marianne Vaatstra is defrosting in the Netherlands. Marianne was only sixteen years old when she was found murdered. Police arrested many people and even held a large scale DNA search but, the perpetrator was never found.
On September 29, 2012, police began a “DNA relationship testing” in a 5 km radius of the crime scene of approx. 8,000 men. In this study, on a voluntary basis, police studied whether there were people who had a similar chromosomal Y-DNA profile as that of the perpetrator. If so, they could try to find a match with familial DNA to trace the killer.
On November 19, 2012, police announced it had found a match. Arrested was Jasper S., a 45-year-old man who lived 2.5 kilometers from the crime scene. Jasper S. apparently voluntarily gave a DNA sample for testing. In a second study of the sample, it was confirmed that his DNA profile matched the DNA traces found on Marianne’s body.
Peter R. de Vries, a Dutch investigative reporter with his own TV show, dedicated a show to Marianne’s case. It can be seen below.
Peter’s website has the full dossier about Marianne’s case and other Dutch cold cases. His website is of course in Dutch. However, if you first just Google “Peter R. de Vries” than you will see the Google translate option behind his website’s information. It is a very well researched site full of interesting cases and forensics. Above all, it gives you insight in how other countries deal with their cold cases and how they actively engage the public to assist police to find a solution.
*Hat tip to Clouseau for the newsarticles
Categories: Cold Case News, Forensics, Unsolved
Tags: Autopsy, Crime Scene, Cruelty, DNA, DNA Database, Evidence, Forensics, Identification, Investigations Division, Marianne vaatstra, Peter R. de Vries, Police, Rape kits, the Netherlands, Unsolved Homicide, Victim, Witnesses
Hi Vidster,
This is an interesting case. I’m curious as to why the police would carry out a ‘mass screen’ of 8000 men but profile their Y chromosomes to check for relatedness. Why not just determine their full profiles for direct comparison to the DNA profiles obtained from Marianne’s body? Or, am I right in assuming that had been done previously? (in which case, Jasper S mustn’t have been included in the initial screen.) Were the initial crime DNA traces Y chromosome profiles?
It’s interesting that Y chromosome profiling has been used in this case. Since the Y chromosome is only present in males, this is a technique that can be used to identify only male DNA, even in the midst of a large amounts of female DNA. For example, in sexual offence cases, where semen has been detected but found to contain no sperm cells, such as if a perpetrator is vasectomised, then one would expect there to be very little DNA from the perpetrator in the sample. This is because most of the DNA in semen is in the sperm and men who have had vasectomies do not emit sperm in their semen. However, there are small numbers of other cells within seminal fluid. Routine DNA profiling doesn’t usually detect the DNA from these if there are large numbers of cells from the complainant present, which is not uncommon in intimate samples. The two cell types are visually indistinguishable and it isn’t possible to separate them easily. (A colleague of mine once described the problem as being like throwing a cup of water into the ocean then trying to recover those exact water molecules. They are lost amongst all the other water.) Y chromosome testing can be used to obtain a profile from these male cells because it is only those cells that contain a Y chromosome. A female complainant’s cells do not.
Since the Y chromosome is inherited down the male line, this test is also used in relationship testing. However it is most commonly used to answer more complex questions of relatedness and usually used alongside other techniques, all of which require direct comparisons of individuals’ DNA.
The other type of familial DNA test out there involves the searching of crime profiles against criminal databases to look for near matches which might indicate that the matching individual is a relative of the perpetrator. An example of this technique being used in the UK is the case of Imraan Vohrer, a nine year old boy who was murdered in 1985. A familial search of The (UK) National DNA Database in 2009 helped to identify the killer as Robert Morley who had died some years previously. At least this was able to provide some answers for Imraan’s family.
As always, another great DCC post!
Best regards,
Sue.