By BBC News World
Dec 27, 2023, 9:37 PM EST
Arizona police reopened a cold case after identifying a body found shot in the desert in 1976.
Hikers found the remains of a man buried in a shallow grave in northwestern Arizona nearly half a century ago.
An autopsy at the time revealed that the man was in his 30s and had been shot. in the head at point-blank range, but the agents could not identify him.
The Mohave County Sheriff’s Office said Tuesday that it was able to identify the victim as the Salvadoran national Luis Alonso Paredes.
In 1976, authorities collected fingerprints during an autopsy, but could not find any matches in available databases.
The Museum of Northern Arizona in Flagstaff produced a composite portrait of his image, but the trail soon went cold and lay dormant for 47 years.
until in November 2023investigators revived the case and compared the fingerprint records to a national database that was not available in 1976 and soon identified the man as Paredes.
Police said the man was working in the Las Vegas area at the time of his disappearance. and noted that he may have been employed by the U.S. Navy and Coast Guard about a decade before his disappearance.
Until now, Agents have not been able to locate any of his living relatives..
While the mystery of Paredes’ identity may have been solved, the decades-old mystery of his murder remains revealed.
Authorities have asked the public to contact them with any information about the case or any leads that may help to find their surviving relatives.
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