HAMILTON COUNTY — Indiana State Police scientists have produced two DNA profiles from remains gathered 26 years ago from the property of serial killer Herb Baumeister, Coroner Jeff Jellison said Wednesday.
What we don't know yet, Jellison said, is whether the remains belong to new victims or people who have previously been identified.
"We don't know if we will match with our comparison samples," Jellison said. "Now that these two DNA profiles have been discovered, they are now working on the comparison samples to see if we can get a match."
Investigators believe Baumeister picked up men in gay bars and brought them back to his home at Fox Hollow Farms in Westfield, where he killed them in the early to mid-1990s.
Authorities found the remains of at least 25 people on Baumeister's property in 1996, Jellison said. Baumeister fled the country after he refused to talk to police investigating the missing men.
Baumeister, 49, killed himself days after police found the first of more than 10,000 bones and bone fragments on his 18-acre property. Authorities found Baumeister's body on July 3, 1996, after he shot himself in the head in Pinery Provincial Park in Canada.
Jellison said authorities recovered DNA from 11 victims back in the 1990s.
In 1999, investigators announced they had identified the remains of eight of those men found on Baumeister's farm:
- Johnny Bayer, 20, Indianapolis, missing on May 28, 1993.
- Allen Wayne Broussard, 28, Indianapolis, missing on June 6, 1994.
- Roger Allen Goodlet, 33, Indianapolis, missing on July 22, 1994.
- Richard D. Hamilton, 20, Indianapolis, missing on July 31, 1993.
- Steven S. Hale, 26, Indianapolis, missing on April 1, 1994.
- Jeff Allen Jones, 31, Indianapolis, missing on July 6, 1993.
- Michael Kiern, 46, Indianapolis, missing on March 31, 1995.
- Manuel Resendez, 31, Lafayette, missing on Aug. 6, 1993.
Even if the new profiles are from previously identified victims, Jellison said this new DNA is still valuable.
"When these remains were discovered in the middle '90s, that DNA technology doesn't talk to today's DNA technology," Jellison said. "So that information from the middle '90s was of no benefit to us."
Of the more than 10,000 bone fragments found on Baumeister's property, most are still unidentified.
Last fall, Jellison announced he was launching a new effort to find the names of Baumeister's victims using modern DNA technology and other techniques.
"We need to reach out we need to let people know... If they had somebody missing, you know, from the '80s to middle '90s, please give me a call and let us do a DNA swab," Jellison said. "We need those comparison samples."
Anyone who believes they might be related to a missing person connected to the case should contact the Hamilton County Coroner's office at 317-770-4415.
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