Victim cut in half in “horrifying” Massachusetts murder 26 years ago finally identified

Investigators say they have finally learned the identity of “Chelsea Jane Doe,” 26 years after the teenager was found brutally murdered in Massachusetts. Authorities said Wednesday that thanks to DNA testing, the victim can now be identified as 16-year-old Tiffany Bradley of Pennsylvania.

Suffolk County District Attorney Kevin Hayden said that on Nov. 13, 2000, police made a “horrifying” discovery in the parking lot of the Chelsea Soldiers’ Home.

“They found a body of an unknown female,” Hayden said. “Tragically she had been cut in half, she was without her head and without any hands.”

Eugene McCollom is currently serving a lifetime prison sentence for her murder. He told police he had buried her head and other body parts in the sand at Nahant Beach. 

But detectives were unable to figure out who she was, until the FBI was able to find her brother using investigative generic genealogy. 

“We have waited so long for this day,” Massachusetts State Police Col. Geoffrey Noble said. “It is rare to have a case like this one, where we knew the suspect’s name before the victim’s.”

Bradley’s family had reported her missing at the time to police in Pennsylvania. Investigators believe she was a victim of human trafficking, and met McCollom shortly after arriving in the Boston area. They say he killed her in his room at the Lynn YMCA.

“Her last conversation with her favorite cousin was cut short with her voice trembling, saying, ‘I’ll call you later. I have to go,'” her relative Shakirah Wiggins said. “That call never came and was replaced with 26 years of waiting, wondering why.”

Bradley was an athlete who played on her school’s basketball team and joined the ROTC. Bradley’s aunt, Janet Bradley-Knight, remembered her as “a loving girl.”

“Thank you so much for letting us take her safely home,” she said. “From the bottom of my heart, for not letting my baby be a box on the shelf. I thank you all for your tireless effort.”

“It is totally amazing that after 26 years people care enough to give her a name and return her to her family,” family member Shakirah Wiggins said.