Authorities in Pennsylvania said this week that they had definitively identified the remains of a child whose corpse was discovered in 1973, concealed in undergrowth underneath a plastic sheet.
At a press conference on Wednesday, Pennsylvania State Police Sgt. Josh Lacey informed reporters that the remains belonged to 14-year-old Ruth Elizabeth Brenneman.
On October 10, 1973, some 47 miles from Brenneman’s York County home, two game wardens discovered the decomposing body of a little girl in a forested area in Lebanon County, according to Lacey.
The cause of her death was unknown.
According to Lacey, authorities have been trying to identify the girl for the past 50 years. In May 2016, authorities exhumed the girl’s body from Mount Lebanon Cemetery in an additional attempt to identify her, with assistance from the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.
Last month, following an examination of her remains at Lehigh Valley Hospital, the definitive identification was finally made. According to Lacey, genealogy was used to identify her.
“As a result of their efforts, this young female will no longer be known as Jane Doe,” Lacey stated.
One “huge step in this investigation,” according to State Trooper Ian Keck, is identifying the body. “We have to know about the victim and their everyday life, who they associated with and their different activities.”
“After she left for school and never returned home,” Lacey stated, Brenneman was last seen. Whether she arrived at school that day is being investigated by officials.
According to Keck, they are also attempting to ascertain whether Brenneman was reported missing and the day she vanished.
“Just because we identified her today that doesn’t end our investigation,” Keck stated. “We’re going to do our best and put our best foot forward here to come to a conclusion.”
Contact Pennsylvania State Police if you know anything about Brenneman or knew her.
Since it is still “pending” with the coroner’s office, Lacey was unable to confirm if there is a person of interest in the investigation or whether it was a homicide.
He acknowledged that Brenneman’s death had “some level of suspicion” “given the fact she was found underneath a tarp in some brush.”
In a statement that Lacey read, Brenneman’s family said that her identification “has provided us with some closure on questions that have lingered for the past 51 years.”
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