The nonprofit Vegas Justice League has helped solve more than 100 murder cases

CNN
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Melonie White was a young mother of a baby boy, a stylish fashion lover and on an inspired search for a new career when her body was found strangled and lifeless.

White was 27 years old when hikers found her body near Lake Mead National Recreation Area, about 10 miles (16 kilometers) east of Las Vegas, on August 27, 1994. Nearly 30 years to the day she was killed, the woman Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department identified White’s suspected killer as Arthur Joseph Lavery using DNA testing and forensic genetic genealogy. He died in 2021, according to police.

After White’s body was found, an autopsy ruled the cause of death was homicide, with evidence of strangulation and blunt force trauma to the head, police said. She had been strangled with a ligature, clubbed and dragged into the desert by a car, police said. During the investigation, police tracked down several leads, but no suspect was ever identified. The case went cold.

For decades, her grieving family was left without answers and with a devastating desire for the truth.

In 2010, cold case detectives recovered even more items and sent them for DNA testing, which led to the DNA profile of a male suspect. But a suspect wasn’t identified until 2021 with the help of the Las Vegas-based nonprofit Vegas Justice League. The nonprofit paid the costs of sending the case to a laboratory that used DNA testing and genetic genealogy to successfully identify Lavery as the suspected killer.

Founded in 2020 by entrepreneur Justin Woo, the Vegas Justice League – and its national initiative Project Justice – have helped solve 41 cold cases across the country, including nine murders in Las Vegas. The initiative provides its financing forensic genetic genealogy, a law enforcement technique that uses DNA analysis and genealogical research to identify suspects in criminal cases or “Jane Doe” victims whose identities have never been established.

Funding for the cases comes from donations from the six members of the Justice League, including Woo and his wife Lydia Ansel, as well as donations from the community. Once enough money has been raised for a case, the nonprofit alerts law enforcement, who then forwards the case to a lab that specializes in forensic genetic genealogy, such as Othram, a Texas-based lab that works exclusively with law enforcement.

On August 26, 2024, about three years after police sent the case to Othram, White’s suspected killer was finally identified.

“It’s nice to put an end to this,” Walter White, Melonie’s brother, said in a speech press conference on October 22. “The effect of her death really devastated my mother. That was probably the biggest problem for our family was that my mother was just completely devastated, it took a long time before the situation was somewhat normal again.

White’s other younger brother, Jason White, also spoke at the news conference, recalling the day he learned his sister had been killed. He was a student at Arizona State University and it was the Friday before he started his semester when he received the phone call that devastated their family.

“I just want to say how grateful we are to the officers of the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department for never giving up on finding Melonie’s killer,” Jason White said as he choked back tears.

“We are extremely grateful for the contributions of the Vegas Justice League, whose donation for police DNA testing enabled police to solve the case. We will always miss Melonie and believe that solving her murder will bring her and all of us a measure of peace.”

Las Vegas Homicide Lt. Jason Johansson also thanked the Justice League for their “unwavering support in helping to provide our community, friends and family” with assistance in solving case investigations.

“It is their support that has directly led to the closure of nine cold cases that would never have been solved without their help,” said Johansson.

Vegas Justice League has also funded ongoing DNA testing for at least 82 other pending cases. It costs about $7,500 per case, Woo says, pointing to the million-dollar sequencing machines used for testing and the staff of geneticists and researchers who then help put all the pieces together.

“We are confident that every case will be solved, but sometimes it takes a long time, months or even years, with the investigation they do,” Ansel told CNN.

Investigators use genetic genealogy to solve cold cases by using suspect DNA collected from a crime scene, analyzing it and converting it into a raw data file. The suspect’s DNA file is then uploaded to databases such as GEDMatch, which is used by people who send in their genetic DNA testing kits to discover their ancestry and find relatives.

GEDMatch analyzes the suspect’s DNA data files and locates individuals who have uploaded their DNA data files on the website and are related to the suspect. A genetic genealogist then builds a comprehensive family tree of the person who uploaded their DNA to try to figure out where in the family tree the suspect is located.

Investigators then collect DNA from members of the extended family until a family member’s DNA matches the DNA found at the crime scene, leading to an arrest.

The new and powerful forensic method has spread widely among law enforcement investigators in recent years. It has been used to solve some of the country’s most frustrating cold cases, most notably the arrest of the Golden State killer in 2018. Joseph James DeAngelo was arrested in 2018 in suburban Sacramento, California on suspicion of being the man who murdered twelve people and raped more than fifty women in the 1970s and 1980s.

The idea for Vegas Justice League started when Woo heard about Othram and saw that they were crowdfunding for business. Woo decided he would sponsor one, which ultimately solved the case of Stephanie Isaacson, a 14-year-old who was kidnapped on her way to school, sexually assaulted and beaten to death in 1989.

“It all started with an effort to help our local community,” Woo said. “When we did the first one, we didn’t know what was going to happen. It took seven months. But when we saw the results, the amount of impact we could have, we just couldn’t stop and made it our mission.”

The nonprofit’s work has not gone unnoticed. The Vegas Justice League was offered with a key to the Las Vegas Strip to honor their efforts in solving homicides on October 30 in a ceremony that included the LVMPD.

Behind every unsolved murder case is a family that has never stopped grieving or longing for justice. While solving a case won’t heal the deep wounds of loss, it can provide a sense of closure. Ansel believes this is the goal they are pursuing.

“It’s such a mix of feelings, where you feel devastated with them over the loss of their child who will never come back,” Ansel said. “But then you feel grateful that they got answers and put some sort of end to this sometimes thirty, forty year long nightmare.”