Adoptive mother allegedly beat son to death and left his remains in culvert in 1959 cold case

OZAUKEE COUNTY, Wis. (TCN) -- Using genetic genealogy, investigators recently solved a 65-year-old cold case surrounding the death of a young adopted child who likely suffered severe neglect and abuse.

According to the Ozaukee County Sheriff’s Office, authorities discovered a human skeleton in a culvert in Mequon, Wisconsin, on Oct. 4, 1959. Investigators determined the child was likely 6 to 8 years old at the time of his death.

The Mequon Police Department launched an investigation with assistance from the sheriff’s office. Law enforcement officials learned that around the same time, the Houghton County Sheriff’s Office in Michigan was investigating a missing child, Markku Jutila. The juvenile’s adoptive parents, William Jutila and Hilja Jutila, reportedly moved from Houghton to Chicago and "were not able to articulate where their 6-year-old son, Markku, was." Family members soon "became suspicious of the whereabouts" of the boy.

The couple admitted to police that they fled to Chicago after Hilja Jutila allegedly beat their adopted son to death. On their way, the two reportedly said they disposed of their son’s body in a ditch. Chicago Police and Houghton County investigators arrested the couple on March 28, 1966.

Even though the adoptive mother allegedly admitted to fatally beating her son, during psychiatric evaluations, both parents said their son had been sick and was sent home from kindergarten.

According to the Ozaukee County Sheriff’s Office, the parents said they found their son dead in his room several days later. Fearing what could happen, they allegedly fled to Chicago and dumped the child’s remains along the way. Ozaukee County authorities said Houghton County Sheriff’s Department investigators reached out to Mequon Police "regarding the human remains located in the culvert and found they had similar features to Markku Jutila."

The Jutilas were extradited to Houghton County to face charges, but they were dismissed "because of the absence of corpus delicti and the failure of the prosecution to connect the skeleton of the child found in Mequon with the defendants."

The case went cold until October 2023, when the Wisconsin Department of Justice Division of Criminal Investigation met with an anthropologist from the University of Wisconsin Oshkosh to identify the child’s skeletal remains. Traditional DNA testing was performed, but no matches were found.

In 2024, authorities submitted forensic evidence to genetic genealogy company Othram Labs. Othram scientists built a comprehensive DNA profile for the child and later identified him as Chester Breiney, whose adopted name was Markku Jutila. Hilja Jutila and William Jutila adopted the child from the Good Will Farm orphanage on March 24, 1955.

According to the Ozaukee County Sheriff’s Office, investigators determined the child sustained severe neglect, suffered from rickets, and had a healed fracture on his rib. The victim’s biological mother reportedly died in 2001 and had no living relatives. Authorities said the child’s adoptive parents also died in 1988, so there will not be any prosecutions in the case.

In a statement from the Ozaukee County Sheriff’s Office, officials said the victim "did not get to experience playing baseball through his elementary school years or fishing with his friends. He did not have the chance to graduate high school or experience adulthood. Chester’s life ended traumatically by the hands of his adoptive parents."

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