For 37 years, she had no name. Just a jacket, and a case number.
On April 24, 1981, three men found a young woman's body in a ditch along Greenlee Road, west of Troy, Ohio. She'd been dead only a few hours. The coroner ruled she'd died of strangulation and blunt force trauma. She was found wearing a fringed, handmade buckskin jacket with a deep purple lining — distinctive enough that it became her name for the next four decades: the Buckskin Girl.
An Investigation With Nowhere to Go
A facial sketch ran in regional newspapers and on television in the days after her death. About 200 leads came in. None went anywhere. Investigators managed to collect her fingerprints, dental records, and DNA — but with no match in any database, the case went cold.
In 2001, a DNA profile was generated from her preserved blood sample. In 2008, her case was entered into the National Missing and Unidentified Persons System, ruling out 226 missing teenagers and young women as possible matches. In 2009, a mitochondrial DNA sample went into the FBI's CODIS database. Still, nothing.
A Possible Serial Killer, and the Evidence That Didn't Fit
In 1991, a multi-state task force formed to investigate a string of unsolved murders across Ohio, New York, Pennsylvania, and Illinois, believed to be the work of a single killer targeting sex workers and exotic dancers, active from the 1980s into the 2000s. Investigators considered whether the Buckskin Girl might be connected — the victims shared some similarities: beaten or strangled, missing items of clothing or jewelry.
But key details didn't line up. There was no evidence of sexual assault in her case, unlike several of the other victims. She was notably well-groomed, with a history of dental care, unlike the pattern seen in other cases. One suspect linked to a separate victim in that pattern, known only by the CB radio handle “Dr. No,” was investigated, but no confirmed connection to the Buckskin Girl was ever established.
What Her Own Body Revealed
In 2016, forensic testing on her clothing offered new clues about who she might have been. Chemical isotope analysis of her hair suggested she'd spent time in central Texas or southern Oklahoma in the year before her death. Pollen recovered from her clothing pointed to earlier time spent in the Northeastern United States. Soot patterns suggested she may have been a habitual hitchhiker, consistent with a transient lifestyle.
The Breakthrough
In 2017, the newly formed DNA Doe Project — a nonprofit using genetic genealogy to identify unknown deceased persons — took on her case as one of its first. Volunteers uploaded a DNA profile built from her decades-old blood sample to GEDmatch, a public genealogy database, and within hours found a match: a first cousin once removed. That lead pointed to a family in Florida, whose DNA sample confirmed it.
On April 10, 2018, the Miami County Sheriff's Office announced her true identity: Marcia Lenore Sossoman King, born June 9, 1959, in Arkansas. She had been 21 when she died. It was the DNA Doe Project's first solved case — a method that has since been credited with identifying more than 150 previously unknown deceased people nationwide.
Her mother had lived in the same home and kept the same phone number for all 37 years, hoping her daughter might one day call.
The Search for Her Killer Continues
In February 2020, Miami County investigators announced a new effort using cutting-edge technology capable of extracting nuclear DNA from hair samples even without an intact root — something previously impossible. Hair evidence recovered from the original crime scene was sent to a paleogeneticist at the University of California for analysis, in hopes of identifying either her killer or someone she'd been with shortly before her death.
Marcia King's murder remains unsolved.
Frequently Asked Questions
Has the Buckskin Girl's killer ever been identified?
No. While Marcia King's own identity was confirmed in 2018, her murder remains unsolved.
How was she finally identified after so long?
Through genetic genealogy — the DNA Doe Project matched DNA from her decades-old blood sample to a distant relative using a public genealogy database, one of the first cases solved using this method.
Was she connected to a serial killer active in Ohio at the time?
Investigators considered it, but key evidence — including the absence of sexual assault and her notably well-groomed appearance — didn't match the pattern seen in other suspected victims, and no confirmed link was ever established.
Is the investigation still active?
Yes. As of 2020, investigators were pursuing new DNA extraction technology on hair evidence from the original crime scene in hopes of identifying a suspect.