Remains found in 1983 identified as Chicago teen slain by serial killer Larry Eyler

Human remains belonging to an unknown victim of the late serial killer Larry Eyler were identified nearly 40 years after they were found buried on an abandoned Indiana farm.

The remains were identified as Keith Lavell Bibbs who was just 16 years old when he was killed by Eyler, the Newton County Coroner’s Office and the DNA Doe Project announced Monday.

Bibbs, of Chicago, was tragically known as “Adam Doe” for roughly four decades after his remains and those of three other Eyler victims were discovered on the farm in rural Lake Village in October 1983.

The four young men had been drugged and murdered by Eyler, who confessed to killing more than 20 victims before his 1994 death while on death row for the murder of 15-year-old Danny Bridges at an Illinois prison.

In 1990, Eyler admitted to killing a young black man in his late teens or early 20s at a Newton County farm in July 1983, DNA Doe Project spokesperson Pam Lauritzen said.

She believes Bibbs may have been the victim that Eyler was referring to.

The DNA Doe Project, a nonprofit organization that uses DNA research to identify Jane and John Does, worked with the coroner’s office as well as Indiana State Police and the Identify Indiana Initiative to positively ID Bibbs.

The project began working on the case in 2020 and only had access to “highly degraded DNA” which researchers used to create a workable DNA profile in a lab process that took over two years.

That profile was uploaded to databases used for forensic cases, but black people are often underrepresented in the DNA libraries and Bibbs’ family tree proved to be quite complex with many name changes, the organization said in a news release.

Genealogists finally made a break when they discovered a DNA cousin’s public family tree.

Newtown County Coroner Scott McCord said he is working to get Bibbs’ remains sent to his living relatives so he can finally be laid to rest 40 years later.

The family asked for privacy while they grieve, he added.

“Everything’s done except for getting him back home,” he said Tuesday. “It’s been a long road getting all those kids identified.”

The DNA Doe Project also helped identify one of the other three bodies found on the same farm as John Bradenbyr Jr. in April 2021.

The other two victims were identified early on in the investigation as Michael Bauer and John Bartlett.

With Post wires