DNA technology is helping police in Mesquite catch a suspected rapist in a decade-old cold case. The department is now looking at using that same technology to hopefully solve other unsolved cases. NBC 5’s Maria Guerrero reports from Mesquite.
Mesquite police say DNA technology recently helped solve a decade-old case involving the brutal beating and rape of a disabled woman.
The police department is now reviewing other unsolved crimes that may also be solved.
Watch NBC 5 free wherever you are
WATCH HEREThe savage attack happened in September 2014 in the 3500 block of Moon Drive in Mesquite.
A passerby reported finding a legally blind woman near two homes.
Get top local stories in DFW delivered to you every morning with NBC DFW's News Headlines newsletter.
SIGN UP “She was beaten. Several bones in her face were broken. She was essentially drug between two houses and left there, and no one deserves for that to happen,” said Detective Brandon Snyder of the Mesquite Police Department's child abuse and sex crimes unit.
While Mesquite police were able to gather the DNA of the victim’s attacker, state databases yielded no hits. Leads were exhausted. The case went cold. That was until two years ago when Snyder learned about investigative genetic genealogy during an FBI training seminar.
According to the Center for Forensic Science Research & Education:
Local
The latest news from around North Texas.
The IGG process utilizes public direct-to-consumer databases and the same genetic genealogy techniques that have historically been used to help adoptees identify their birth families or parents. IGG involves determining relationships between individuals based on their shared DNA. When combined with traditional genealogy research, potential identifications of unknown individuals can be made to help in unidentified human remains (UHR) cases or to develop leads in unsolved violent crimes.
“The idea behind the IGG work is to find familial relatives to your suspect,” he said.
Snyder asked the FBI agent leading the forum if the 2014 case would be a good candidate for IGG, and the agent agreed that the case should be reopened.
For the next two years, Snyder and the FBI Dallas Field Office worked together, scouring public genealogy databases in hopes of finding anyone related to the woman’s attacker.
Eventually, they found a partial match. A genealogy database led police to a distant relative of the suspect. Snyder then worked through the family tree for any links to the crime and came to 27-year-old Jorge Post.
Post, who was 17 at the time of the attack, lived one street over from Moon Drive, according to Snyder.
According to the arrest warrant, police and the FBI began surveilling Post in April 2024, looking for a DNA sample to confirm the match. While on his lunch break at a Mexican restaurant, the Family Dollar employee tossed a Coke can in the trash before leaving, according to the affidavit.
An FBI agent reportedly collected the can to be tested, and three months later, a lab result confirmed Post as the attacker, according to the affidavit.
“It’s one of the best feelings in my career to know that we were finally going to bring this case some closure,” said Snyder.
Snyder said he hoped to bring closure to more families and is now searching through the department's unsolved violent cases to present to the FBI for potential genealogy testing. The work is costly and time-consuming, so not all cases can be considered.
“Primarily, these will be homicides and sexual assault cases that need to be solved, that deserve to be solved,” said Snyder. “Those are the cases where we have DNA evidence.”
Post is in jail on a $5 million bond, charged with aggravated sexual assault of a disabled person. Post has no known criminal history and it's not clear if he's obtained an attorney to speak on his behalf.
