Somagen Provides Breakthrough in Solving Unresolved U.S. Sexual Assault Case

On September 4, Somagen announced that it had contributed to identifying a sexual offender who had remained at large in the United States for 38 years through its proprietary state-of-the-art genome analysis technology.

The case involved a sexual assault committed by the suspect, Russell Marubbio, against a female clerk at a Chevron gas station located at 13452 Jefferson Davis Highway, Woodbridge, Virginia, on December 19, 1987. The case had remained unsolved for 38 years.

The cold case was reopened in 2019. The Physical Evidence Recovery Kit (PERK), collected from the victim in 1987, was resubmitted to the Virginia Department of Forensic Science (DFS) for modern DNA testing. Investigators were able to extract a male DNA profile from the kit, believed to be that of the suspect.

Additionally, detectives sent another piece of evidence-a cutout stain from the victim’s underwear-to the Marshall University Forensic Science Center to extract information for genetic genealogy analysis. The results matched the DNA of twin brothers: John Arthur Marubbio of Deltona, Florida, and Russell Anthony Marubbio of Palatka, Florida. However, this alone was not sufficient to determine which of the identical twins was the actual perpetrator.

In August 2022, to resolve this rare case involving identical twin suspects, detectives requested advanced DNA analysis from Parabon NanoLabs and Somagen. Parabon and Somagen provided a solution based on the fact that while identical twins start with the same DNA, rare 'somatic mutations' can occur after the twins split during early development, creating subtle genetic differences between them.

Using deep whole genome sequencing and specialized bioinformatics analysis, the teams identified unique somatic mutations in each twin and directly compared these to the DNA recovered from the crime scene. It was determined that Russell Marubbio’s DNA was an exact match to the DNA collected at the crime scene. This result was accepted as evidence in court and played a major role in the arrest and conviction of Russell Marubbio.

Hong Soo, CEO of Somagen, stated, "As a specialized genome analysis company in the United States, we feel immense pride in being able to help identify the suspect in a sexual assault case that remained unsolved for 38 years using our superior, proprietary genome analysis technology. We will continue to grow as a global genome analysis company that not only achieves sustainable corporate growth but also contributes to society."