MEQUON, Wis. – With the help of genetic genealogy, police in southeastern Wisconsin have recognized the body parts of a child who was found in a Wisconsin culvert in 1959. This ends a 65-year-old cold case.
Ozaukee County Sheriff’s Office said the body is that of Chester A. Breiney, a seven-year-old boy whose life ended “traumatically at the hands of his adoptive parents.” The discovery came after a lot of work on the investigation, which included DNA testing and a family history study.
Chester’s body parts were first discovered in Mequon on October 4, 1959. At the time, investigators only had the child’s bones to go on, so they thought the kid was between six and eight years old.
Over the years, leads came up in both Wisconsin and Michigan, mostly about Markku Jutila, a lost child. When police asked Markku’s foster parents, William and Hilja Jutila, about it, they admitted that they had left their dead son’s body on the side of the road near Mequon.
But in 1966, the Jutilas were not charged because there was not enough proof to connect the remains to Markku. This left the case open.
Recently, new attempts have led to a big step forward. The remains were found to belong to Chester Breiney, who used to go by the name Markku Jutila. To do this, Special Agent Neil McGrath, Detective Scott Heller, and forensic analysts from the Wisconsin Department of Justice worked with labs and genealogists to use modern DNA extraction and genealogy methods.
The study of Chester’s bones showed that he had been neglected and malnourished in the past. Since his foster parents died in 1988, they can’t be charged with anything.
The Ozaukee County Sheriff’s Office said in a statement, “No child should leave this Earth like Chester did,” and they hoped that Chester Breiney could now rest in peace.
The office recognized that everyone involved in the investigation had worked together over many years. They said that without this cooperation, Chester might never have gotten justice.
Source: Wisconsin cold case solved 65 years later, revealing tragic death of adopted child
