DNA from hat found in 1974 leads to arrest in 50-year-old Dunn County murder case

With the help of genetic genealogists in New Jersey, the Dunn County Sheriff Sheriff’s Office has arrested a suspect in a 50-year-old murder case.

Sheriff Kevin Bygd said being able to give closure to the victim’s family and former investigators is “pretty unreal.”

On Feb. 15, 1974, Mary K. Schlais of Minneapolis was found dead on a roadside in the Dunn County Town of Spring Brook.

The death was ruled a homicide and investigators at the time believed Schais was hitchhiking from Minneapolis to an art show in Chicago. Dunn County Sheriff Kevin Bygd told WPR there was an eyewitness who observed a suspect and a vehicle they believed was connected to the murder.

“Eyewitness reports aren’t always 100 percent accurate, but it developed some leads over the years,” Bygd said. 

Investigators from multiple law enforcement agencies worked on the case, including the state Division of Criminal Investigation, Bygd said. As time passed and investigators retired from their respective departments, the cold case ultimately landed back at the Dunn County Sheriff’s office.

Bygd said investigators from his department partnered with a team of genetic genealogists at Ramapo College in New Jersey. Using a hat found at the crime scene 50 years ago, they were able to identify “a viable DNA link to a family.”

That led investigators to Wyoming, where a potential suspect voluntarily offered a DNA sample, which was ruled out. Bygd said the Ramapo College team kept working and “pretty much got a 100 percent match” with an 84-year-old Minnesota man named Jon Miller.

“My investigation staff went to his apartment in Owatonna, Minnesota, yesterday and sat down with him,” Bygd said. “And he confirmed his involvement in the homicide from 1974.”

Miller was arrested and charged with first degree murder. He is being held in the Steele County Detention Center in Owatanna while awaiting extradition to Wisconsin.

“To know that we can go to her (Schlais’) family, her brother and sister in-law and niece, who are all still alive, and bring them some closure is an incredible feeling,” Bygd said.

Bygd said he’s worked at the Dunn County Sheriff’s Office for more than 35 years, and investigators have been working on this case throughout his tenure.

“To finally send a text to some of my former coworkers who have since retired, that worked on this case over the years, and say, ‘Suspect in custody in Mary’s 1974 homicide,’ You know, it’s pretty unreal,” Bygd said.