In 1984, nine year old Christine Jessop disappeared from her Ontario community, sparking one of Canada's most well-known murder investigations. What followed was years of heartbreak, a wrongful conviction, and decades without answers.

In this episode, we explore how DNA evidence first exonerated an innocent man and, decades later, how investigative genetic genealogy finally identified Christine's true killer.

Because sometimes justice means finding the guilty. And sometimes it means proving the innocent were never guilty at all.

For more than four decades, one of Canada's most haunting mysteries had no answers and no identity.

In 1977, the body of a young man was discovered in a rural Alberta septic tank. He had been brutally tortured and murdered. Investigators searched for his name, his family, and his killer, but every lead ended the same way: nowhere.

Over time, the victim became known only by a nickname: Septic Tank Sam.

But behind that nickname was a real person with a family, a history, and a life that had been shaped by one of Canada's darkest chapters, the Sixties Scoop.

🎧 This is the case that proved genetic genealogy doesn't just uncover the truth... it can change the rules of justice itself.

For nearly four decades, the murder of eight-year-old Ljubica Topic remained one of Ontario's most heartbreaking unsolved cases. Her family waited years for answers, while investigators held onto a single hope: that one day, science would catch up.

In 2022, it finally did. What followed wasn't just a forensic breakthrough. It became a legal and ethical question that Canadian police had never faced before.

Should a deceased suspect be publicly named based solely on DNA evidence?