Will County can finally ID woman in 1968 cold case

The mystery surrounding the identity of a woman found dead in Will County in 1968 has been resolved, the Will County Coroner’s Office reported this week.

The woman was successfully identified as 33-year-old Martha Basset, a Native American woman originally from Wapato, Yakima, Washington, the coroner’s office said.

“This case is emblematic not only of advances in forensic science, but also of the enduring determination of families and officials to bring closure to long-unsolved tragedies,“ Will County Coroner Laurie H. Summers posted on her office’s Facebook page.

Initial investigation

The body of a woman was first discovered Sept. 30, 1968, in the brush near the intersection of Interstate 55 and Blodgett Road in unincorporated Will County, the coroner’s office said. Law enforcement determined that the woman was the victim of a murder, according to the coroner’s office.

Because of limitations of investigative resources and forensic technology at the time, authorities were unable to make a positive identification.

Basset’s body remained unidentified for decades and was interred in Oakwood Cemetery in Wilmington.

The lack of leads, limited means of communication between jurisdictions and absence of technological tools such as DNA testing kept her identity a mystery, the coroner’s office said.

Reopening the case

In 2009, Will County Coroner Patrick K. O’Neil established a cold case unit to address cases such as this one. The team that year exhumed the buried remains, looking to take advantage of advances in forensic science, the coroner’s office said.

Portions of the skeletal remains were sent to the University of North Texas and the Smithsonian Institute Paleontology Department, and the analysis “determined the remains were possibly of Native American descent,” the coroner’s office said.

Eight years later, another study was conducted by the University of Illinois Forensic Anthropology Department. Its analysis supported the 2009 conclusion that the remains could be of both Asian and Native American descent, the coroner’s office said.

“This additional detail further narrowed the potential pool of missing persons, guiding investigators toward new avenues,” the coroner’s office said.

The cold case team took “a proactive approach” and contacted Native American tribes in Illinois, Wisconsin, Minnesota and Iowa, inquiring about any missing person reports from the late 1960s that matched the victim’s description, the coroner’s office said.

The Bureau of Indian Affairs ”was instrumental" in helping move the case forward by creating and disseminating a flyer that was posted on social media and distributed within Native communities, the coroner’s office said.

That outreach generated a lead, and the county contacted Emily Washines out of Washington state, who is a distant relative of Martha. Washines was able to create a background on Martha, and the coroner’s office was able to contact a niece of Martha. That niece provided the necessary DNA to make the match, the coroner’s office said.

The coroner’s office credits cooperation from the community, family and the Attorney General’s Office of the state of Washington for its assistance.

Another DNA analysis

Summers authorized another exhumation by the coroner’s cold case unit in partnership with the Will County Sheriff’s Office on Sept. 13, 2024, to extract additional DNA from the remains for more advanced gene-sequencing techniques.

Portions of the skeleton were sent to Othram Inc., a forensic genetic genealogy company in Woodlands, Texas, that specializes in using cutting-edge DNA analysis that could identify victims or perpetrators in cold cases, the coroner’s office said.

Genetic genealogy provided a match, confirming that the remains were those of Bassett, who had moved to the Chicago area in 1960 as part of the Indian Relocation Act of 1956, a federal initiative that sought to encourage Indigenous people to move from reservations to urban centers.

“After more than 50 years, Martha was no longer a nameless victim, and her family was finally given closure,” the coroner’s office said.