A teenager found dead in 1982 in the United States has finally been identified. His alleged murderer has also been charged.
She was nicknamed “Princess Doe”, the affectionate nickname that the city of Blairstown, in the United States, gave her after the tragedy. On July 15, 1982, this teenager was found dead in this small New Jersey township by cemetery workers. For 40 years, this young girl without an identity, of whom no one knew anything, remained a mystery. Who was she? What happened to him ? Last Friday, the authorities announced that they had finally been able to put a name to the victim. Dawn Olanick was 17 when she was killed near Long Island, reports the New Jersey Herald.
Prosecutor James Pfeiffer explained at a press conference that even if this case had remained unsolved for decades, the investigators never “forgotten” the teenager. It will have been necessary to wait for DNA research techniques to evolve so that finally, his identity is returned to him. It was last February that a team of scientists was able to re-examine DNA samples from the little princess of Blairstown, which had previously been in too bad a condition to be usable. Once these expertises were carried out, the genealogists took over in order to find his family.
Killed two days before being found
Investigators say Dawn Olanick was killed two days before her body was discovered. Her skull had been fractured in several places, suggesting that she had been beaten with a bat or an iron bar. His identification had been made all the more difficult as the body had begun to rapidly decompose due to the high heat that summer. Along with announcing his identity, police also said a suspect had been charged. Arthur Kinlaw, a 68-year-old man who is already in prison for the murder of another woman, confessed in a 2005 letter to having killed the teenager. But justice could not prosecute him until the young girl was formally identified. On the day of the crime, Arthur Kinlaw allegedly tried to force Dawn Olanick into prostitution. When she refused, he kidnapped her, drove her to New Jersey and killed her.
It was agent Eric Kranz who chose to nickname the victim “Princess Doe”, estimating according to the “New Jersey Herald” that she was “probably someone’s princess” or had been at some time of his life. This case has fascinated the United States. In 1983, the story was told in a documentary on HBO. It has also made it possible to develop the treatment of missing persons and their identification.