Two days before John Richard Moulis’ sister died, she finally learned what had happened to her missing brother.
“She had wondered what happened to her brother her whole life,” Sanford Police spokesperson Bianca Gillett told WFTV. “I know that is meaningful to the investigators, that they were able to give that closure to her before she passed.”
What Happened to John Richard Moulis?
Moulis’ car was found abandoned at an Orlando Greyhound bus station decades ago, according to a statement from police.
Moulis had moved from Wisconsin to the Orlando area around 1986. He lived at the Ridge Club Apartments and worked in janitorial services at Splendid China in Kissimmee.
His remains were found in a wooded area in 1997, and authorities determined that he had been the victim of a homicide. However, it took nearly 30 years to confirm his identity with the help of genetic genealogy.
“For almost 30 years, John’s family has agonized over not knowing what happened to him, not knowing if he would one day come home,” Chief Cecil E. Smith said. “Though this information doesn’t bring John home, it does give the family the information they desperately wanted for 29 years.”
John Moulis Identified Through Genetic Genealogy
The investigation’s first major breakthrough came in 2023, when detectives sent a tooth from the unidentified remains to the Pinellas County Medical Examiner’s Office for DNA extraction, police said.
The resulting profile was entered into the Combined DNA Index System, or CODIS, but produced no matches.
In 2025, police received financial support through a forensic investigative genetic genealogy grant and sent bone specimens to Orthram Labs for further testing.
The laboratory created a DNA profile and used it to conduct a genetic genealogy search, according to a statement from Othram.
In July, the Florida Department of Law Enforcement told Sanford Police that investigators had identified a possible close relative of the unidentified man. The following month, police confirmed that the remains belonged to Moulis.
John Moulis’ Homicide Remains Unsolved
Investigators will now work to determine who killed him. The medical examiner found that Moulis died from sharp-force injuries to the head, police said.
“Investigators will now focus on discovering what happened to John, and who brutally cut his life short,” Smith said in the police statement. “I am proud of my investigators for not giving up, and know that for them, they will continue working to bring justice to John and his family.”
Additional questions were sent to police, but no immediate response was received.
Anyone with information about the case is asked to contact the Sanford Police Department or submit an anonymous tip to Crimeline at 800 423-TIPS (8477) or www.crimeline.org.
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