The P.I. Post: How a murder was solved with a postage stamp

Welcome to the next installment in my P.I. Post series. In these posts, which you’ll find on the blog about every other month in between the Nonfiction Nuggets series, I’ll be sharing details on P.I. topics, unique stories and interesting case reviews. I don’t intend to share specific details about cases (I’ll share links for further reading when appropriate for anyone who would like more information), but some posts might offer information on subject matters that might be difficult for sensitive readers. I’ll try to offer specific warnings when appropriate, but please take care as you read each post. 

Now, let’s get started. The next topic in the P.I. Post is about a murder that occurred in Italy back in 2010. I chose this particular case because it has more than enough twists and turns to make anyone’s head spin, especially with regard to family dynamics.

This case involves a 13-year-old girl named Yara who disappeared not far from her home in November 2010. Efforts were made to find her, but sadly, her body was discovered in a field three months after her disappearance. Her death definitely involved foul play, but ultimately it was determined that the actual cause of death was exposure. Imagine how many involved with the case must have had a difficult time with “if only” thoughts about whether she could have been saved…if only she’d been found in time.

The authorities did everything they could to find the suspect responsible for the girl’s disappearance and death. Police usually investigate those closest to the victim and while the perpetrator did leave DNA at the scene, it didn’t match anyone in the victim’s family or her known friends. In their attempt to solve the case, authorities decided to get creative in order to obtain DNA samples to test against the suspect DNA.

Want to dance? Please submit your DNA…

Imagine going out with your friends and when you arrive at your local night club, you’re asked to provide a sample of your DNA. That’s exactly what happened when authorities took samples from people who visited a local night club on the weekends in the spring of 2011. They were able to gather thousands upon thousands of DNA samples to test against the suspect DNA. But would they get lucky with the results? And did authorities believe their suspect would willingly hand over his DNA if he happened to visit that particular night club?

A shot in the dark gets a hit

The plan worked, but not exactly as you might imagine. The DNA from one of the night club guests, a man named Damiano, was found to have a similar profile to the suspect’s DNA found at the scene. It wasn’t an exact match, however, which meant they didn’t yet have their suspect identified and further investigation and testing were needed. A family tree was compiled to list all family members with ties to the same DNA, after which investigators located and performed DNA tests on multiple family members.

This is where the case may have fell flat, if investigators only focused on the living. The family tree indicated that Damiano’s father had a brother named Giuseppe. But Giuseppe died in 1999, so he couldn’t possibly be involved in Yara’s death. Would the police feel it necessary to attempt to gather his DNA?

Be like a postage stamp and stick to one thing

Law enforcement made contact with Giuseppe’s widow and she was able to provide to them postage stamps from which her late husband’s DNA could be collected. Testing on that DNA provided a surprising result…it was a match to the DNA left at the scene. But since Giuseppe died years before Yara’s death, it could only mean Yara’s killer was Giuseppe’s biological child.

There was a light at the end of the tunnel, as tests were administered to determine which of Giuseppe’s offspring could be eliminated and which could be arrested for the crime. But the case hit another snag when tests revealed that the children of Giuseppe and his widow were not a perfect match to the suspect’s DNA.

The plot thickens, as does the family tree

The case went cold for some time after that. Authorities dove back into the case in March 2013 when they decided to exhume Giuseppe’s remains in order to compare his DNA again. Those tests only confirmed that he was most certainly the biological father of Yara’s killer. Additional investigation into Giuseppe’s life revealed he may have been unfaithful and might have had a child with another woman. Since he had been employed as a bus driver and had contact with the public, law enforcement went to work investigating hundreds of women Giuseppe might have interacted with.

And all that hard work paid off

In June 2014, the authorities came into contact with a woman by the name of Ester who may have had an affair with Giuseppe. After further investigation and DNA tests were conducted, it was discovered her DNA also matched the suspect DNA. The suspect’s biological mother was found.

Ester had been married to her husband for over 40 years and had three children, including twins, which her husband assumed were his. But in fact, Ester became pregnant during her affair with Giuseppe and he was the biological father of the twins, a boy and a girl. The police focused on Massimo, the male twin, as their suspect.

And as they had the past couple of years, they were creative about how to gather a sample of his DNA.

From night clubs to roadblocks to DNA reults

Yara’s cell phone gave off its last signal in the city of Mapello, which is where Massimo also lived with his family. The police focused on that area by putting up a roadblock in order to gather Massimo’s DNA sample. Would a killer voluntarily hand over his DNA to get through a roadblock? It appears that he did… whether because he didn’t think he had a choice, because he didn’t realize his DNA had been left at the scene, or possibly because he thought he was too smart to get caught. Either way, once they had his DNA, further testing confirmed he was a perfect match to the suspect DNA. He was charged with Yara’s murder and in July 2015, he was sentenced to life in prison.

The investigators in this case were like a dog with a bone and were pretty amazing, when you think about it. They gathered DNA from thousands of people at a night club, ran tests on that DNA, and years later investigated hundreds of women who might have had contact, and possibly a relationship with, Giuseppe. The person responsible for Yara’s death would not have been found and her family would not have had closure, if not for the creative and thorough work of the investigators on the case.