SEATTLE _ In opposite corners of the country, two families were on flip sides of the same tragic mystery. One, in Texas, had lost a wife to suicide in 2010, then learned that she was not who she claimed. So who was she? All their digging turned up nothing.
The other, in Pennsylvania, had lost a family member, too, back in 1986. The young woman had fled abruptly, leaving no clue. Where was she? They spent 30 years hoping she was alive and safe.
Earlier this year, a former Social Security Administration (SSA) investigator, Joe Velling, became convinced the dead woman, known as Lori Ruff, and the Pennsylvania woman were one and the same.
It had been a long road to get to this point. The SSA investigates identity theft, and Lori clearly had stolen someone else's identity _ that of a 2-year-old girl from Pierce County, Wash., who had died in a fire decades earlier. An aide to a Texas congressman had asked Velling to look into the case, after being contacted by the Ruff family.
There was no indication she adopted the new identity for financial gain. So why did she do it? Velling used every tool he had, but turned up nothing. This was highly unusual.
With the support of the Ruff family, Velling turned to a reporter he knew at The Seattle Times in 2013, hoping that crowdsourcing would provide an answer. Surely somebody would recognize her from years ago. The story, which ran on the front page and later in publications all around the world, captured the online imagination.
For three years, a large cadre of dogged online sleuths has been trying to solve the mystery.
Late last year, a California scientist called Velling with a theory: Lori Ruff came from a family back East, she said. The Cassidys. Based on the evidence she provided, Velling believed she was right. Earlier this year, he took a plane to Philadelphia to knock on the door of one member of the Cassidy family. He had no idea what he was walking into. He didn't even know the missing woman's name.
The Ruffs had provided him some photos, and he began laying them out on the table.
"My God," the family member said, "that's Kimberly!"
Kimberly McLean, who left home at 18 and never came back.
