(PUEBLO COUNTY, Colo.) — After over two decades of investigative work, the Pueblo County Sheriff’s Office (PCSO) said the remains of a man found in a field north of Pueblo in 2000 have been identified.
According to PCSO, in November of 2000, a woman found a body while walking her dog in a field just north of the Walking Stick development, near the Colorado State University Pueblo campus. The body did not have any identification and was mostly skeletal by the time it was discovered, PCSO said.
The Pueblo County Coroner conducted an autopsy, and while the cause of death was undetermined, foul play was not suspected. PCSO said an anthropologist was contacted to analyze the remains and estimated the man was of mixed race, between 35 to 50 years old and was between 6’1″ to 6’3″ tall. The man also had thick black hair that was in dreadlocks.
For months after the body was found, PCSO said sheriff’s detectives worked unsuccessfully to identify the man. In November 2001, a sculptor from the University of Colorado made a facial reconstruction using the man’s skull to create a clay bust. Photos of the bust were sent to the media, the public, and were posted on websites for missing persons seeking help in identifying the man.
According to PCSO, only a few leads came in, including one from a rancher who identified the man as someone who had been camping on his property in August 2000. The property was near the field where the remains were found. The rancher said the man told him he was traveling from New Mexico to Denver.
PCSO said even though the leads and tips dwindled, sheriff’s detectives kept working on the identity of “John Doe”. In June 2021, detectives revisited the case and learned that the FBI had completed a DNA profile of the man, and that information was now in a combined national DNA database. Sheriff’s detectives obtained a new DNA sample from an item in evidence that was taken from the campsite when the body was found, and with the assistance of the Colorado Bureau of Investigation (CBI), the new DNA sample was submitted to a genetic genealogy database in 2023.
In November 2024, a DNA match was made with a distant family member. Detectives then obtained a DNA sample from a suspected sibling, and PCSO said it was verified the week of June 23, 2025 by a Forensic Investigative Genetic Genealogist that the DNA comparison matched the unidentified man–Marvin Majors.
Majors was originally from Oklahoma and grew up in Los Angeles. PCSO said he was around 34 years old when he died.
According to PCSO, Majors’ family knew he led a transient lifestyle, but they had always wondered what happened to him. They had not heard from him since the late 1990s.
“Through modern science and teamwork, our detectives were able to get the breakthrough they needed to identify this person,” said Pueblo County Sheriff David J. Lucero. “The years of dedication, diligence, and perseverance by our detectives demonstrate that no matter how old a case is, they are committed to solving it. This was somebody’s family member, and our team went above and beyond to identify him and to bring some closure to his family.”
