The human body found on the California River has been identified as a 13-year-old New York girl who disappeared 50 years ago.
The partially skeletal site was first discovered almost exactly 30 years ago on a riverbed off the Watsonville highway, but the case was run after the initial DNA test showed that it was a woman.
However, more advanced testing confirmed that her body was Laura O'Malley, a 13-year-old Queens girl who was reportedly missing in August 1975. The Santa Cruz County Sheriff's Office announced this week.
However, “It is unknown when or under what circumstances Laura O'Malley arrived in California,” the sheriff's office emphasized.
It was also unclear how she was believed to have died.
The young teen was identified when cold cases resumed in 2019, and additional forensic tests including carbon dating show that the deceased is now born in the 1960s and died between 1977 and 1984.
In 2022, advanced genetic testing was used to identify potential families, and ultimately confirmed that it was a New York girl she has been caring for for a long time, police said.
Since she went missing, O'Malley's brothers – two sisters and brothers – continued searching for her for years, circulating her photos in Manhattan.
The Sheriff's Office said it was “deeply grateful” that it had finally “provided the much-anticipated answers to Laura's family.”
