An "Identify the Missing" Day in Orange County, California, has led to the identification of Kristyne Olivia Trejo's remains, the Associated Press reports. Trejo had been missing since 1988.
The event, held by the coroner's division of the Orange County Sheriff's Department, collected cheek swabs from the relatives of 34 missing people to compare their DNA to that of unidentified remains.
According to her son Andrew Trejo, Kristyne Trejo disappeared from Santa Ana after leaving home to attend a meeting for recovering addicts, the AP says. It adds that there is an open homicide investigation into her case.
"There are so many unidentified people who need to be identified," Bob Hunter, a deputy coroner investigator for San Bernardino County, tells the AP. "This needs to be a national event annually for every county in the United States." His county, he adds, has the remains of some 600 unidentified people.