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1988 murder of Pennsylvania woman finally solved thanks to genetic genealogy testing

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The 1988 murder of a Pennsylvania woman has finally been solved thanks to DNA evidence collected from a letter sent to a local newspaper a decade ago and from the victim's clothing.

On Thursday, the Pennsylvania State Police and Berks County District Attorney John Adams held a press conference about the unsolved murder of 26-year-old Anna Kane, NBC News reported.

They identified her killer as Scott Grim, the news outlet reported.

According to Pennsylvania Crime Stoppers, Kane's body was found on Oct. 23, 1988, near Ontelaunee Trail Road in Perry Township.

She had been beaten and strangled to death, the media release said.

Law enforcement said they collected DNA evidence off the clothing of the mother of three, the Reading Eagle newspaper reported.

The news outlets reported police tested the DNA, but no match was found at the time.

After running a front page article in 1990 about the unsolved murder, the newspaper received a letter from a "concerned citizen" with “numerous intimate details” about the homicide, law enforcement told NBC News.

The news outlet reported that DNA collected from the envelope was later tested and found to match the DNA collected from Kane's clothing.

NBC News reported that sometime this year, Parabon NanoLabs in Virginia conducted genetic genealogy testing and found that the DNA profile likely matched Grim.

According to NBC, Grim wouldn't be brought up on charges since he died of natural causes in 2018. He was 58.