On Aug. 28, 1988, Pierce County Deputies (Washington) responded to a call of a body found in the Puyallup River near Sumner, Washington. A fisherman had located the body of a woman, identified two months later as Tracy Whitney.

Detectives were called out to the scene and an autopsy was performed. The autopsy revealed Whitney’s cause of death to be asphyxia by strangulation and probable smothering. She had several blunt force injuries and was believed to have been sexually assaulted. Her death was ruled a homicide and DNA swabs taken from the body.

Detectives interviewed everyone who knew or had dated Whitney to try and find the killer. Unfortunately, the case went cold for years.

In 2005, DNA collected at the crime scene was sent into CODIS; however, no matches could be found. With a grant offered by the Washington State Attorney General’s Office in 2022, the cold case detective sergeant submitted the DNA to a third-party lab for genetic genealogy—and they found a match.

The suspect, John Guillot Jr., died a few weeks prior. Detectives matched the suspect DNA to Guillot’s biological son to confirm Guillot Jr. was the suspect. There were no connections between Tracy and Guillot Jr., and detectives believe this was a stranger abduction, rape and murder.