Headless victim in 1976 New York cold case identified through DNA: police

The headless, handless body of a man found on the side of a lonely road in New York’s Allegany County 56 years ago has been identified through DNA advancements, officials announced this week.

Still, his killer hasn’t been caught.

The body of Clyde A. Coppage, 35, was discovered along a road in Andover in upstate New York in March 1970.

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“Over the course of nearly 56 years, investigating members of the New York State Police continued to track down every lead, but the identity of the male remained unknown,” New York State Police said in a news release Thursday.

Coppage was originally from Pennsylvania and hadn’t been reported missing.

He didn’t have any clothes on or any other way to identify him, Trooper James O’Callaghan said Friday, according to the Albany Times Union.

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O’Callaghan said the evidence suggested Coppage was killed and dismembered somewhere else before his body was left on the rural Davis Hill Road in Andover.

In June 2022, his body was exhumed for a DNA profile, and, with the help of the FBI, he was finally identified.

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State police said the Bureau of Criminal Investigation out of NYSP Amity is asking for the public’s help for any information about Coppage or his killer.

The investigation into his death remains active, police said.