Using the same DNA technology used to capture the Golden State Killer, Greeley Police Department solves 20-year-old kiddnapping and sexual assault

Greeley Police Department used DNA evidence to identify a man they believe is responsible for a 20-year-old kidnapping and sexual assault case. Photo courtesy of the Greeley Police Department.

By Kelly Ragan

Using DNA evidence, the Greeley Police Department identified the man they believe is responsible for a a 20-year-old kidnapping and sexual assault case. 

The incident happened Sept. 18, 2001 near 5th Avenue on 9th Street, according to the release. 

The victim, then a 7-year-old girl, was walking to school with her 8-year-old brother when a man, believed to be Jaime “James” Zamora, forced her into his car. The man drove the girl to a secluded area south of the Greeley airport and east of U.S. 85, where he sexually assaulted her, according to a news release. The girl got away and made it to the Air National Guard gate near the airport, where police were called.  

According to the release, police did collect physical evidence at the time, but they couldn’t identify a suspect, and the case went cold. 

The girl told police that the man who assaulted her was light-skinned and spoke a little Spanish, according to the release. She told police she thought he was around 25 years old with a bad complexion and a tattoo of a snake on his forearm. 

In August 2019, Greeley police reached out to Parabon Nanolabs, a DNA technology company in Virginia for help with the case. The company specializes in DNA phenotyping – the process of predicting a person’s physical appearance and ancestry using unidentified DNA evidence. 

The news release specified that Greeley police used only public available databases with law enforcement programs for the investigation. 

According to Pew Charitable Trusts, Parabon Nanolabs has relied on public databases, such as GEDmatch, to identify at least 83 crime suspects and 11 homicide victims between May 2018 and January 2020 when it began offering genetic genealogy services to law enforcement agencies.  

The company charges about $1,500 to process DNA and another $3,500 for genealogy research time, according to Pew. 

This method of solving cold cases using DNA evidence and publicly available DNA samples gained traction in 2018 when investigators were able to use genetic code databases to identify and arrest the Golden State Killer – one of California’s most prolific serial killers. 

Joseph James DeAngelo was arrested in 2018 after investigators found a partial match to his great-great-great grandparents using GEDmatch. DeAngelo was sentenced to life in prison August of 2020 after confessing to 13 murders and dozens of rapes, according to a report by CNN. 

Opponents of the method say privacy is at stake as more law enforcement agencies use DNA technology. 

Natalie Ram, an associate law professor at the University of Maryland, told Pew she knew DNA databases were useful to police. 

“There's no doubt that law enforcement could solve more crimes if they could have more access to more people all the time,” Ram told Pew. “Privacy is an essential human good. It's necessary for human flourishing and for liberty.”

But, thanks to access to the database, Greeley police were able to solve a 20-year-old cold case. 

Using the DNA evidence collected from 2001, Parabon Nanolabs’ program, Snapshot, was able to produce a composite drawing showing what the person may have looked like when they were 25 years old, down to the eye color, skin color, face shape, ancestry and freckling. The program based the composite off an average body-mass index.  

The composite, as well as genetic genealogical research by Parabon, information led to Jaime “James” Zamora, according to the release, who lived in Greeley and was 26 years old in 2001. 

Police learned Zamora died in 2014 while living in Wellington.

Law enforcement collected evidence from Zamora’s autopsy and sent it to the Northern Colorado Regional Forensic Laboratory for a traditional DNA analysis. The DNA was a match to the sample collected in 2001, according to the release. 

Police notified the victim and the family. 

From what police could gather in a subsequent investigation, they found Zamora was estranged from his family and a loner. In 2001, he worked for a local sandwich shop that no longer operates in Greeley. 

Police are seeking more information about him and ask anyone who knew Jaime “James” Zamora or had any interactions with him to contact Greeley Police detective Robert Cash at (970) 350-9601.