Jodine Serrin's parents bought her a condo because they wanted her to have the independence she'd earned. She managed her own home, despite a developmental disability, and she was proud of that. On Valentine's Day, 2007, that independence is what made it possible for something terrible to happen to her without anyone knowing for hours.
A Life Lived on Her Own Terms
Jodine — known to her family and friends as Jodi — was 39 years old, living alone in a ground-floor condominium on Swallow Lane in Carlsbad, California. Her parents, Art and Lois, had purchased the home for her, and while they checked in regularly and helped with some household tasks, Jodine managed most of her daily life independently. Her family would later describe her, in a statement issued after her case was finally resolved, with real warmth: "Jodine taught us all with her special challenges, perseverance and love of nature."
A Visit That Turned Into a Nightmare
On the evening of February 14, 2007, Art and Lois came by with gifts to celebrate the holiday with their daughter. She didn't answer the door. Assuming she might be asleep, they let themselves in — and found the main room of the condo empty.
Hearing sounds from the bedroom, Art went to check. He opened the door and found Jodine on the bed with a man on top of her. Believing he'd interrupted a private moment, he told the man to get dressed and leave, then quietly stepped out to give them privacy, expecting an embarrassed couple to emerge shortly after.
Several minutes passed. Nothing happened. Art went back to check.
What he found the second time was nothing like what he'd assumed the first time. Jodine had been beaten and was not breathing. The man was gone, having fled through the bedroom window, which was left open.
Art called 911 immediately. It was too late. An autopsy determined Jodine had died from blunt-force injuries to the head; she had also been raped and strangled.
Eleven Years Without an Answer
Investigators collected DNA evidence from the scene, but in 2007, the technology to make use of it in a case with no existing database match simply didn't exist yet. The case went cold, and stayed cold for over a decade — though Carlsbad police have said they never stopped actively working it.
Art and Lois Serrin have said they leave their hometown every year on Valentine's Day, unable to be there for the anniversary of the day they lost their only daughter.
A Breakthrough Through New Technology
In 2017, on the tenth anniversary of Jodine's murder, Carlsbad police announced a new approach: a partnership with Parabon NanoLabs, a Virginia-based company specializing in DNA phenotyping — a technique that uses genetic evidence to predict a person's likely physical traits and ancestry even without a database match. Using DNA recovered from the crime scene, the company generated a composite image and trait profile of the suspect, including likely eye color, hair color, and other features, which police released publicly in hopes of generating new leads.
The approach worked. Investigators eventually narrowed their search to David Mabrito, a transient with family ties to the area. When his DNA was compared against the crime scene evidence, the match was about as conclusive as forensic science gets — a 1-in-64-quintillion probability that the DNA belonged to anyone else.
In November 2018, Carlsbad police announced the case was solved. Mabrito had been 38 at the time of the murder. He had taken his own life in 2011 — six years before investigators ever connected him to the crime, and seven years before his name was made public.
Resolution Without a Trial
There would be no arrest, no interrogation, no trial. The person responsible for Jodine's death had been gone for years by the time anyone knew his name. Carlsbad Police Chief Neil Gallucci spoke to what that kind of resolution actually means for a family: "We are thankful to provide a resolution of this case to Jodine's family. We never forgot Jodine and we are grateful to have identified the person responsible for her tragic murder."
It wasn't justice in the conventional sense. But for a family that had spent eleven years not knowing, having a name — and knowing the search itself was finally over — mattered.
Jodine's case remains a frequently cited example of how DNA phenotyping and investigative genetic genealogy have changed what's possible in cold cases that technology simply couldn't touch at the time they happened. Cases like hers, where physical evidence existed but pointed to no one within the system's existing databases, are exactly the kind that this newer generation of forensic tools was built to finally unlock.
Sources
Carlsbad Murder Mystery Solved: DNA Reveals 2007 Killer as Suicide Victim — Times of San Diego https://timesofsandiego.com/crime/2018/11/13/carlsbad-murder-mystery-solved-dna-reveals-2007-killer-as-suicide-victim/
DNA Technology Identifies Suspect in Woman's Unsolved Valentine's Day 2007 Killing — NBC San Diego https://www.nbcsandiego.com/news/local/jodine-serrin-carlsbad-cold-case-murder-suspect-david-mabrito/168412/
Rape and murder suspect identified in 11-year cold case based on new genetic technology — NBC News https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/rape-murder-suspect-identified-11-year-cold-case-based-new-n936016
Cold-Case Carlsbad Murder Solved: Police — Carlsbad Patch https://patch.com/california/carlsbad/cold-case-carlsbad-murder-solved-police