Just The Tip-Sters: True Crime Podcast · Melissa Morgan, Bleav

LOOKS LIKE MARY ALICE MALONEY IS HOME

·39 min·2 clips

A 2% DNA match from GEDmatch became the closest lead in Mary Alice Maloney’s identification.

1. Just The Tipsters: True Crime Podcast focuses this episode on Mary Alice Maloney and the DNA genealogy work that identified her after nearly 20 years as a Jane Doe. 2. Melissa Morgan hosts with Joshua Bevan, and their banter about car electronics, braces, and a “baby Bjorn” for robot overlords sets the episode’s loose tone. 3. The episode asks what DNA Doe Project researchers can do when a body is found in LaVergne, Tennessee, but the person’s name has been lost. 4. Melissa says Mary Alice Maloney was originally from Connecticut and had been living near Nashville when she disappeared in 2007. 5. She says Maloney’s remains were discovered on November 14, 2007, and investigators estimated she died in the spring or summer of 2007. 6. Melissa describes the clay bust made from Maloney’s remains and says the reconstruction did not capture her face well. 7. She identifies Maloney as mixed race, with Puerto Rican and African-American ancestry, and says the body was found with some jewelry but no clothing. 8. Melissa names Missy Kosky as a friend of the podcast and a team leader at the DNA Doe Project who posted the case on Facebook. 9. She says Jenny Lucus, the DNA Doe Project, the Laverne Police Department, the late Sergeant Bob Hayes, the University of North Texas, GEDmatch Pro, and FamilyTreeDNA all contributed to the identification. 10. Melissa explains that the team used open-source DNA databases and public records to build Maloney’s family tree. 11. She says the crucial breakthrough came from a new GEDmatch match in April 2021 that connected to a Laverne, Tennessee, native. 12. That match was only a 2% cousin connection, but Melissa says it was the closest DNA lead available. 13. The team traced a distant relative who married a man of Puerto Rican descent, then linked that branch to a daughter named Mary. 14. Melissa says further research showed that Mary had been living in Nashville until 2007, when she disappeared from the records. 15. She emphasizes that the identification process took about four and a half years from April 2021 to the naming of Mary Alice Maloney. 16. Melissa says the case still leaves the central question unanswered: who harmed her and why she ended up in Tennessee. 17. The episode uses conversational, comedic back-and-forth even while discussing braces, tariffs, and forensic genealogy. 18. Melissa’s delivery shifts into a more earnest, investigative register when she explains GEDmatch, FamilyTreeDNA, and the DNA Doe Project’s pro bono work. 19. People interested in DNA genealogy, Doe cases, and forensic identification would likely want this episode. 20. Listeners wanting a tightly plotted crime narrative with little comedy may skip it.

As heard by us

A loose, listener-centered episode finds its investigative turn through a DNA Doe Project Facebook post.

A Facebook post from Missy Kosky, a friend of the podcast and team leader at the DNA Doe Project, gives the episode its investigative turn, though the path there stays personal.

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Why you'd press play

Press play when you want a murder podcast that can wander through car trouble, phone chaos, and listener mail before the case enters through a DNA Doe Project connection.

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