CITIZEN DETECTIVE DELAWARE COUNTY HOMICIDE FUND

Citizen Detective is a podcast hosted by criminal behaviorist, Dr. Lee Mellor, Mike Morford and Alex Ralph. Together, with our in-house panel of experts in forensics, geographical profiling and death investigation, Citizen Detective works with individuals like you to bring resolution to unsolved homicides across the nation.

Many homicides go for decades without being solved. Families remain in limbo, never experiencing closure regarding the murder of a loved one. As the years pass and the cases grow colder, many law enforcement agencies do not have the resources to invest in advanced forensic testing and other investigative tools that were unavailable at the time of the crimes.

When we cover cases on the show, the most common thing we hear from the victim's family is that police do not have the money to test existing evidence for DNA. Forensic technology has come so far, just in the last few years, that we find it unacceptable to let these cases remain unsolved when there is something we can do to help. Forensic testing is crucial to identifying perpetrators of violent crime. After all, the use of genetic genealogy led to the capture of Joseph De Angelo, the Golden State Killer, in 2018.

Recently, Delaware County, Oklahoma reached out to Citizen Detective, asking for our help in solving fourteen homicides and missing persons cases, dating back to the 1970s. Delaware County is a small, rural and underfunded police jurisdiction with virtually no support for extensive investigations into the following cases . . .

Johnnie Halbert Ball (male 60) missing from Kansas, Oklahoma since September 1988. Declared dead in 1996.

Georgie/Georgia Cannaday (female 48) was murdered in her home in Jay, Oklahoma in 1973.

Dustin Ray Carver, (male 20) missing from Kansas, Oklahoma since March 2014.

Aubrey Dameron, (transgender female 25) missing from Grove, Oklahoma since March 2019.

Johnny Lee Eller, (male 34) was found dead of a gunshot wound while on vacation at Red 11 Port Resort in Grove, Oklahoma.

Misty Dawn Faulkner, (female, 29) missing since January 2011 from Eucha, Oklahoma.

Doris M. Harris and Dan "Danny" Oakley, (Female, 40, male, 37) were found shot to death in Oakley's mobile home near Afton, Oklahoma in February 1996.

Barbara Johnson-Willard, (female, 29) missing from Colcord, Oklahoma since June 1996.

Timur Mardeyev, (male, 27) Missing from Grove, Oklahoma since November 2011.

Phillip Porter, (male, 56) was found dead in his home with his throat cut in January 2012. Ruled a suicide.

Brett Adam Scheele, (male, 37) was found dead in a woodsy area in Colcord, Oklahoma in December 2021.

Peggy Sweeten, (female, 52) missing from her home in Grove, Oklahoma since January 1988.

Christopher Teel, (male, 32) was last seen on January 2, 2017, in Jay, Oklahoma. Remains found in February 2023.

Tyson Wright, (male, 49) was found dead in burned vehicle in the Zena area in January 2021.

With your donations, Citizen Detective can expand its ability to assist Delaware County with these investigations by funding efforts such as forensic testing, travel for our investigators and the establishment of tip lines. Suzanna Ryan, Laboratory Director of Pure Gold Forensics, is on our team and prepared to test evidence at a reduced cost, just to ensure that law enforcement has all the support it needs to make the arrests.