Jane Doe Homicide Victim Identified In 54-Year-Old Case, Siblings Reunited

HOWARD COUNTY, MD — The oldest cold case in Howard County has caught a break with the identification of a homicide victim and the reunification of two of her children, officials said Thursday during a news conference.

Howard County police have identified a Jane Doe victim as Sadie Belle Murray, and put two of her surviving adult children in touch who didn't know about each other or what had happened to their mother.

In July 1971, Murray was found unconscious in a Woodstock field after an apparent assault, police said. She was taken to the hospital, where she died from her injuries on Sept. 7, 1971. For 54 years, her identity remained unknown, and the homicide investigation went cold.

But with advances in DNA profiling and the relentless pursuit of answers by the police department's cold case unit, police identified that woman as Murray, born Sept. 7, 1924, in Pennsylvania. At the time of her death she went by Sarah Belle Sharkey.

“The work done by our cold case unit to solve a mystery of more than 50 years, and then bring siblings back together after 70 years apart, is nothing short of extraordinary,” Howard County Police Chief Gregory Der said during a news conference. “Our department will use every tool available to help close cases. In this instance, a combination of advanced technology and dedicated police work provided answers that had eluded a family for decades.”

Using genealogy technology, cold case investigators also identified her two surviving adult children as Charles Leroy Sharkey, 79, of Cleveland, Ohio, and Mildred Marie Cantwell (Sharkey), 81, of Springfield, Ill. They met in July 2025 when cold case detectives notified them of their progress in the case.

“Today marks the culmination of our efforts and our persistence in public safety. Since taking office, we’ve made solving cold cases in Howard County a priority because justice delayed doesn’t need to mean justice denied,” Howard County Executive Calvin Ball said at the news conference. “Together with Chief Der and our law enforcement leadership, we’ve taken decisive steps to ensure that every unsolved homicide is treated with the urgency and care it deserves. Their work reminds us that justice has no expiration date.”

In October 2024, the police department submitted histology slides from the case for advanced forensic analysis by a private company, Othram. This resulted in a DNA profile from the samples and HCPD investigators worked with the company’s forensic genetic genealogy team to build a family tree.

"It's a very complex investigation and we had to track down a lot of DNA pieces," Sherry Llewellyn, spokesperson for the Howard County Police Department, said at the news conference. "With the expansion of the cold case unit, we can reopen cases so we went back and looked at police evidence, and we found still refrigerated slides from 54 years ago."

The family tree led investigators to Charles Sharkey, who was originally thought to be a distant cousin. But his DNA was a direct familial match and he was determined to be Sharkey’s son. Howard County detectives then located his sister, Mildred Cantwell.

“It’s actually great and it’s something that I thought would have never happened,” Sharkey said in a statement. “I thought I’d never connect again with my family. I tried there for a while, even traveling to Pennsylvania, where we were born, and Cleveland, where we were adopted. I got nowhere. There was nothing.”

“Learning about my mother was closure for me,” Cantwell said in a statement. “I always wondered … and I am glad to have that closure. Being reunited with my brother is awesome. He’s the only thing in that family that I remember. The closure is worth everything because I always wondered what happened to her.”

Llewellyn said during the news conference that the siblings knew there were other siblings and had vague memories of the orphanage where they were placed.

"I believe there's at least one other adult child, a woman who died in 2020, and there may have been other children who died in early childhood," she said. "The adult children expressed to cold case investigators that they had some memories of being taken to orphanages where they were separated, and did recall other children in their family. They didn't know how to go about finding the others. They were very young when placed in orphanages, so they don't really have recollection of the circumstances around that time."

Detectives continue to investigate the circumstances of Sarah Sharkey's death.

"We know very little about her and her life. We do believe she was primarily a resident of Pennsylvania, so that raises the question of why she was here in Howard County. We hope to answer that now that we know who she is," Llewellyn said.

Kristen Mittelman, chief development officer for Othram, the company that analyzed the DNA, said time is of the essence in a 54-year-old cold case.

"It's time sensitive because people don't live forever and they need to know what happened to their loved ones," Mittelman said. "We work with law enforcement all over the country and our overarching message is always the same: more of the cases can be solved. And they can all be solved faster when people understand how the process works."

Othram scientists developed a DNA extract from the provided evidence and then used forensic-grade genome sequencing to build a comprehensive DNA profile for her. Othram's in-house forensic genetic genealogy team then used the profile in a genetic genealogy search to develop new investigative leads that were returned to law enforcement, Mittelman said.

Using this new information, a follow-up investigation was conducted, leading investigators to potential relatives of the woman. Reference DNA samples were collected from potential relatives and compared to the DNA profile of the unknown woman using KinSNP Rapid Relationship Testing. This investigation led to the positive identification of Sarah Sharkey, the company said.

HCPD’s cold case unit has closed three cases since 2021:

• In April 2025, HCPD arrested and charged Edward Robinson, 31, of Columbia, in the July 2020 shooting in Columbia that killed Rabiah Ahmad and forced the delivery of her baby girl, Ahja, who died five days later.
• In March 2025, HCPD closed the 1975 homicide of Roseann Sturtz. Charles William Davis Jr., who has been incarcerated in the Jessup Correctional Institution since 1978, confessed to her murder but could not be charged as he was given full immunity to discuss the case in 1981.
• In May 2021, HCPD closed the 1982 homicide of Laney Lee McGadney by charging Howard Bradberry Jr., then 62, with her murder. Bradberry Jr. pled guilty in 2022.

All open cold cases are listed on the HCPD website. Anyone with information about any of the cases is eligible for a reward of up to $30,000 and should contact police at 410-313-STOP or HCPDCrimeTips@howardcountymd.gov.