Myrtle Brown went missing in May of 1990. After telling her family she wasn’t feeling well, she went to the emergency room in Brooklyn at the King’s County Hospital. She had epilepsy and no longer had her medication because someone had stolen her purse and the medication along with it. She went to the emergency by herself in hopes of receiving a refill of her medication.
When Myrtle never came home, her mother and other family members started going to local hospitals and police stations trying to find out what happened to her. They never found any answers. But 32 years later Myrtle’s brother, Robert Brown, was watching the nightly news and saw something that would finally give them the answers.
Nearly 32 years later, in April, Myrtle’s brother, Robert Brown, was watching “NBC Nightly News with Lester Holt” when it aired a profile of the cold case squad at the New York City Office of Chief Medical Examiner. Led by Dr. Angela Soler, assistant director of forensic anthropology, the team manages nearly 1,250 unidentified person cases, most of them tracing back decades, many to the 1990s.
Within the report, Robert Brown spotted a picture on a missing person’s poster of a facial reconstruction, a tool used by the team to draw public attention to cases by recreating facial features via a clay model.
After seeing the news report Robert and his wife called and spoke to someone about the cold case that was reported. Dr. Angela Soler was on the case. She had a starting point since the family knew she went missing in May of 1990.
For nearly two months, Soler reviewed over two weeks of records of “unverified unknowns” or missing people with a potential name that has not been verified or confirmed. She started her search from May 1, 1990, until she found what she believed was a presumptive match to Myrtle Brown, on May 17, 1990. The unidentified person in the recreation was not Myrtle.
Dr. Angela Soler called Robert Brown and Eboney Brown and told them that she believes she found Myrtle. Soler shared all the information she had on Myrtle’s case. She even sent them a photo of the deceased woman to confirm if it was Myrtle or not. Both Robert and Eboney knew within seconds it was Myrtle.
Myrtle, who was 35, was never registered or admitted to King’s County Hospital, but the family learned she had been waiting in the emergency room when she had a seizure and died. The only information Myrtle gave to the hospital was her name and date of birth.
The Brown family held a virtual memorial for Myrtle. They feel they can now be at peace since they know what happened to Myrtle.
Source Today
