Ep. 95-The Murder of Tonya McKinley-Solved by DNA and Genealogy

A sunny Gulf Coast day can hide the darkest secrets. We kick off with light banter about warm holidays and beach-town charm, then turn to a haunting case from New Year’s Day, 1985: 23-year-old mother Tonya McKinley leaves a Pensacola bar and is found hours later, assaulted and strangled. Investigators collected semen and blood at the scene, interviewed witnesses, and chased every lead, but the limits of 1980s DNA and disconnected databases let the trail go cold. For decades, Tonya’s family lived with a name-shaped void.

Everything changes when genetic genealogy enters the picture. We unpack how detectives partnered with Parabon NanoLabs to build a family tree from crime scene DNA, narrowed possible relatives, and focused on men who lived nearby in 1985. A discarded cigarette butt from Milton resident Daniel Wells provided the crucial match in 2020, aligning with the original forensic profile and ending 35 years of uncertainty. We explore the steps behind the scenes—surveillance for touch DNA, laboratory confirmation, and the decision to share his profile with other agencies to probe possible links.

Then comes the emotional whiplash. Wells is arrested and reportedly admits involvement, but he dies by suicide in jail before facing trial. We wrestle with the complex feelings that follow: gratitude for the science that named a killer, anger at the loss of courtroom truth, and empathy for a son who grew up without a mother or a full story. Along the way, we tackle the ethics of using consumer DNA databases for law enforcement, balancing privacy with the power to solve cold cases and deliver overdue accountability.

If you care about true crime, forensic science, cold case breakthroughs, and the real families behind headlines, this story will stay with you. Listen, share with a friend who follows DNA sleuthing, and tell us your take on genetic genealogy and justice. Like, rate, and subscribe—your support helps us shine a light on the next case that still needs a name.

Source material:

Carrega, Christina, March 21,2020, DNA from discarded cigarette solves a 1985 cold case murder, https://abcnews.go.com/US/dna-discarded-cigarette-solves-1985-cold-case-murder/story?id=69706091

CBS News, March 20, 2020, Tonya McKinley murder: Man arrested in 1985 killing of mother after DNA found on cigarette, https://www.cbsnews.com/news/tonya-mckinley-murder-daniel-wells-arrested-florida-1985-killing-young-mother-dna-found-cigarette/

Li, David K., March 19, 2020, Florida man arrested in 35-year-old cold case murder thanks to DNA on cigarette, https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/florida-man-arrested-35-year-old-cold-case-murder-thanks-n1164051

Johnson, Amanda, April 2, 2020, Man accused in 1985 Pensacola cold case murder of Tonya McKinley dies in jail, https://weartv.com/news/local/pensacola-cold-case-suspect-dies-in-jail

Transcript

Warm Holidays And Small Talk

SPEAKER_01 0:00

The new year is supposed to bring hope and the idea of a fresh start. But for Pensacola, Florida, it brings tragedy. This is Hold My Sweet Teeth. Happy New Year. I'm Pearl. And I'm Holly.

SPEAKER_00 0:52

And yay. Christmas is over. Yes. It didn't feel very Christmassy this year. Uh-uh. It's warm. Yeah, I know. I was like, why is it almost 80 degrees on Christmas? But that's, you know, the gamble you take in the south.

unknown 1:05

It is.

SPEAKER_01 1:07

You're like Santa Claus out here with his sunglasses and swim trunks. Right.

SPEAKER_00 1:12

Will it be warm? Will it be unseasonably cold? Who knows? Today, like as we move on and everything, it is cold. Yeah. My car was frozen this morning. All the frost. Like just a week later, like the temperature shift was crazy.

SPEAKER_01 1:30

And this is why everyone gets sick. Yep.

SPEAKER_00 1:32

In the South. Yeah. The flu is running rampant.

SPEAKER_01 1:37

It is.

SPEAKER_00 1:38

Knock on wood.

SPEAKER_01 1:39

The new strain of flu. The new strain. This the one that everybody's seems to be catching that's they're going to get tested for COVID. And flu A and B, and they're like negative, negative, negative. But you do have flu, just not this one. You have flu C.

SPEAKER_00 1:58

You have flu new. Flu new. Flu new, you had the flu.

SPEAKER_01 2:04

Oh my goodness. Oh my gosh. The things that fly out of my mouth. Right.

SPEAKER_00 2:11

But you're but you're taking us to somewhere that's known for its sunnyness, right? Yes, we're gonna talk about a Florida man. Oh, that's always interesting. That's the the news in Florida, always. Right. A Florida man. You're like, oh, this is gonna be good.

SPEAKER_01 2:31

Did something wacky kooky? Yep. Yeah. All the time. We are going to Pensacola. Florida. Pensacola. I like Pensacola.

SPEAKER_00 2:41

I do too. It's a fun place. It's cute in Pensacola. It's not the dirty, dirty side of the Gulf of Mexico. No, it's pretty. But it's the it's the going on to the prettier side of it.

SPEAKER_01 2:56

Yeah. It's it's the I c I like to think of it as a great compromise. Yes. It's right there. If you can't get to Destin, where all the sand is white and right. Mirror, all that. All that super, super pretty. Yep. Pensacola's okay because it's still you can still see through the water. The sand's a little more brown, but it's it's okay. It's

Setting The Scene In Pensacola

SPEAKER_01 3:20

it's still mostly white.

SPEAKER_00 3:21

Yeah, it's it's getting there. It's changing. Yeah, it's it's a light, you know, beige beige. But it's good. Yeah, it's really fun there. And they got the big water tower that looks like a beach ball. Yeah. So you know you're like, you know, yeah, that's for sure.

SPEAKER_01 3:38

Me and um my daughter, the last time we went, found this like really cute teeny tiny hole in the wall place where we got burgers, and she got some deviled egg potato salad. Oh my goodness. Because this girl loves deviled eggs, and it tasted just like freaking deviled eggs with potatoes in it. It was crazy. That sounds good. They were it was really good. They had really good food, and that's what that's what we were hoping. We were like, hey, look at this place, right?

SPEAKER_00 4:07

It's you know, in the middle of nothing and it's tiny. Let's eat here. The last time me and my son went, I like splurged a little so we could be like right on the beach. Yeah. So you like walk out of the hotel and you're like boop, boop, boop on the beach. Yeah, and it was like the best time.

SPEAKER_01 4:25

Yeah, we did that in uh Fort Walton. We got a little condo, yeah. And I even it included beach service. I was like, yay, chairs. I don't have to drag all that down there, but I still had to bring, you know, a cooler. Yes. Still gotta have the drinks. You got to have the water while you're out there getting your sunburned. We are whiter than white. Yeah. I like paper. I'm whiter than paper. Yes. I kid. I'm not sure.

SPEAKER_00 4:57

You know what I don't have?

SPEAKER_01 4:58

But I burn melanoma. Right. What's it burned? Yeah. I will burn. I have to like cake on the sunscreen. So does Ray. She's very, very fair and freckly.

SPEAKER_00 5:10

So not my mostly Native American child. He just turns like dark.

SPEAKER_01 5:16

Yeah. He gets real jerk. No, I'm just kidding. He looks like he has a tan all year. Yeah. Unfair. Uh, anyway. A Florida man. Florida man. But we're gonna talk about a Florida woman first. Oh, okay. We're gonna talk about Tanya McKinley. She was 23 years young, super excited for the new year, looking forward to what it would bring for her. She was looking forward to watching her 18-month-old son grow and learn everything to look forward to.

SPEAKER_00 5:59

Yeah, like ready to take life and go with it.

SPEAKER_01 6:04

Yeah. It's unclear how long she had been in Pensacola. They didn't live there the whole, you know, this whole time. So um, but she was like really one of those people that never met a stranger, you know, talk to everybody. Everybody talked to her, much like us, unfortunately. I tried to have an unkind face, but apparently it doesn't work. No, just kidding. People are like, I'm gonna talk to you anyway. Literally if I'm out, people were like, hey, can you take our picture? Or ask me directions, or ask me where the enemas are

Tanya McKinley’s Night Out

SPEAKER_01 6:40

when I'm standing in Walmart. I'm like, bro. It's not for me. Yes, it is. Okay. I don't care about your bowels, but they're you're standing right in front of them. Right. You didn't have to ask. Just look down. Like I'm in front of the vitamins, you're standing right in front of the architect. Just look down. But she's that kind of person. Like everybody's everybody likes her. She's really sociable and everything else. Very approachable. It was 1985. Ooh, so big hair. Yes. Funny clothes.

SPEAKER_00 7:19

All the colors. Right? The pants that you like pegged at the bottom and rolled up.

SPEAKER_01 7:24

Or those little skirts with the spandex shorts attached underneath, and they're like the shorts are to your knees and the skirt barely covers your butt. Yep. You know? And it's attached. Like you beat the whole suit where it's attached, like the crop top thing, but it still has something under it. Yeah. It has like your stomach's not showing.

SPEAKER_00 7:43

Yeah. You're not showing too much leg.

SPEAKER_01 7:45

No. It's just like so funny. Because I I took a picture in a wine glass.

SPEAKER_00 7:51

Oh, yep. The 80s wine glass picture, the brandy glass. That's what it was.

SPEAKER_01 7:56

So that's the brandy glass with the rose. Yep. It's like everybody did it. And so 1985. She's ringing in the new year at Daryl's Bar and Grill with some of her friends that she'd made. Good old Daryl. Daryl's. She's last seen leaving this establishment around 1.30 in the morning. Fast forward four hours later, Tanya's body, partially nude, would be found laying in an empty lot about two feet from the street by a woman and her daughter who are taking their dog to an emergency vet. How traumatic is that? Right. You're already in emergency mode because you're And then you're like, uh, do I stop?

SPEAKER_00 8:56

Do I what do I do? You know?

SPEAKER_01 8:58

Yeah, and then you find you come upon a dead half-naked lady. I'm like, holy crap. Right. That's some messed up stuff, especially on New Year's Day. Tanya had been sexually assaulted and strangled. Now there was a good bit of physical evidence. There was semen, blood. So they had they had DNA. Right. They had some stuff to go on. So of course they send all that stuff off to be done so that they can see if there's a match anywhere in the system. Doing all the things, interviewing everybody that's in Daryl's.

SPEAKER_02 9:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 9:44

Interviewing her family members to see if she talked to anybody before leaving to find out, you know, the normal stuff. Is there anyone who you think would want to

The Crime And Early Evidence

SPEAKER_01 9:55

do like harm her at all? And despite all these interviews and the DNA stuff, there would be no match. And so this case would eventually go cold. Right. Now, every few years there'd be a new lead. And the Pensacola police said, you know, every time there's a new lead, we drop everything. Right. And we're following this lead till it ends. And that is exactly what each and every single one of those leads would eventually do.

unknown 10:33

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 10:33

So and like in 1985, there's not a lot DNA. Yeah. It wasn't really that big. And even if they had semen, it still wasn't, you know, something that they could just be like, oh, we've got this huge database. Right. Because databases weren't databasing.

SPEAKER_01 10:51

And that's why people weren't so concerned with leaving their DNA.

SPEAKER_00 10:54

Because they were like, they'll never find me. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 10:57

It's like if if it's a lot of those data, like you said, databases are not databasing. They're not, they're your database is your database. Right. They weren't sharing or didn't weren't in the habit of sharing all this with all the different.

SPEAKER_00 11:21

Oh, yeah. Now it's a big thing. It's required.

SPEAKER_01 11:24

Right. But before that wasn't a thing at all. So yeah, all these advances and changes have been great in the crime-solving world. Absolutely. For sure. So, you know, they're they're just trying their best. All while her son is growing up. Her parents bury her without answers and without justice. And her killer's just walking around Freezebird. He's probably out there, you know, thinking, I got away with this. Living his life without caution. Just my my question is, is he still doing things like this?

SPEAKER_00 12:11

Right. Has he had other victims, or was it a one and done? And he's like, right, now I've got to disappear into the background, you know, so nobody connects me to that.

SPEAKER_01 12:20

I like sit and wonder, is there a chance that maybe maybe he's g feels guilt and tries to live the rest of his life right? Right. Who knows? It's unclear what he does after. And I'm like, can someone who's capable of doing something like that actually feel guilt and remorse? I mean And remain silent about a very small portion. Not tell anyone but still feel bad?

SPEAKER_00 12:54

There is a very small portion that would come forward, but I think for the most part, if they're they've done something like that, they've they've spent 35 years not being caught. Right. Then they really just kind of brush it off as like whatever I got away with it, I'll never be caught.

SPEAKER_01 13:12

Yeah. But enter the genealogy era. Woop whoop. You know, everybody's going crazy on

Why The Case Went Cold

SPEAKER_01 13:20

ancestry.com 23andme. Right. Swab their cheeks and send it in. Everybody wants to know where they came from. They want to find long-lost relatives. You know, you've got all the all the people who've been adopted as adults are going, hey, I want to find my birth family. Let's let's give my DNA ran, you know, whatever. So there's so many reasons that people are dumping their DNA into these databases. More and more websites and places available to send it into. And it's like just so accessible to the public that police begin using these databases in hopes of making a family tree and tracking down a killer.

SPEAKER_00 14:05

Exactly. And you can submit your DNA results to the like. Yeah, now you can choose to share it for that very reason. I've chosen I've shared mine just in case, like, you know, there's something that family member thing like that connected because I'm like, why not? Yeah, why not? It's not I'm not out here. So like my my DNA's fine. But if it, you know, somebody in my family did something, they could connect that to them. Some 63rd cousin. That's how they caught the golden state killer, right? I think it was the woman who submitted her DNA to the database and it came back like as a you know kind of a match. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 14:48

And they have like that's how, yeah, they have groups now that's that literally sit, and this is what they do. They they take a DNA sample, they run it through different databases until they find slight matches. They want it to be over a certain percentage because the the bigger the percent, the closer they are to finding who the person is. But yeah, it's amazing.

SPEAKER_00 15:12

Yeah, it is.

SPEAKER_01 15:12

It's a long process, but it's amazing. So the police, of course, work in conjunction with Parabon Nano Labs, and they start making this family tree. And the police want to look at all the males in the family that live or lived nearby in 1985. And if they get a hit, then they follow that suspect, collect any discarded items that would contain DNA that they could use in order to confirm the match.

SPEAKER_00 15:52

If you've committed a crime, just know that when you throw that coffee cup in the garbage, yeah, yeah, I can grab that behind you. Yeah, it's trash.

SPEAKER_01 16:01

Yeah. Once it comes out of your hand, there's it's no longer yours. And that's exactly what happens here. They began this process in 2018, and by March of 2020, they had a DNA match. They had secured a discarded cigarette butt. So obviously, investigators are following their suspect, his name is Daniel Wells. He's 57 years old at this point. Right. And he's smoking in his car. Yeah. Throws that cigarette out the window.

SPEAKER_00 16:48

Right?

SPEAKER_01 16:49

Find that cigarette butt now. Pick it up, take it in. And so the DNA from

The Genealogy Breakthrough

SPEAKER_01 17:00

the cigarette butt matches the DNA from the semen taken off the victim's body. Nice. And this is in the warrant for his arrest that it says all of that. And so they would arrest 57-year-old Daniel Wells of Milton, Florida, and charge him with murder and sexual battery.

unknown 17:26

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 17:28

They also would share his DNA with other local law enforcement agencies because Mr. Wells has never moved from the area. Oh wow. So he has literally spent his entire life right there. Right there in the same area that he committed this crime.

SPEAKER_00 17:52

That's how safe he felt. Yeah, he was like, they're never going to catch me. It'll never happen. I'm a free man. Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_01 18:01

So anybody, any local law enforcement that they knew of that had any open cases where they were searching for someone, sexual battery cases, murder, it didn't matter. They put it out there. And so whether anything comes from that or not, I didn't find. But they did indeed make sure that his DNA was shared with anyone and everyone to try to help with any open cases to see if he's ever done it again. Because naturally nobody thinks that a person who does something like that and gets away with it only did it once. Right. Hell sometimes they don't get away with it and they still did it more than once. So it does say that he confesses to the police when he gets arrested that he did it. Right. Just kind of happened upon her. So crime of opportunity at that point. Right. Um, some sort of argument ensued.

SPEAKER_00 19:09

I think because he was raping her.

SPEAKER_01 19:11

Right. But there's there's no other explanation as to why or what happened in those early morning hours when he met up with her. I mean, other than what we know from what the crime scene showed. Police would call Tanya's son Tim with the news. He's the first one they call. And they actually ask his permission to record the phone call. And you can go to the Pensacola police Facebook page and listen to this phone call. And he like he just can't believe it. Yeah. Like he literally has to tell the police to hold on a second. Like when and he's like trying to process this. And he's like, You're serious? And they're like, serious. I have trouble. After all this time, you're serious. And he's like, Yeah, we're serious. So from 1985 to 2020, he you know, they they finally find this guy, and of course, I'd be stunned too. Yeah. Because at that point, you know, they figure it's

Zeroing In On Daniel Wells

SPEAKER_01 20:18

it's never gonna happen. But it did. And Tim tells Pensacola News Journal, my mom, she never got to raise me, never got to be a part of my life. Wells got to live his life the last 35 years. He got to have a family, he got to be around his children. In all those years, he was out there knowing what he did. He was carrying it around with him, and he was never going to tell anyone. He wasn't going to ever just say what he did on his own. Nothing could ever make up for losing my mom, but at least now we know what happened to her. Right. And so sad because he didn't get to know his mom either. Like she didn't get to know him, but he didn't get to know her either. And it's from the sounds of it, she was a good woman. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 21:10

And he probably, you know, just what his family told him and pictures and maybe some video or something. Just that's all he gets. Right.

SPEAKER_01 21:20

Renee McCall is Tanya's sister. She's a 62-year-old nurse, and she tells NBC News, I didn't really think this would happen in my lifetime. Not after 35 years. She said she was pleased about the arrest, but that she's also saddened her dad died without knowing what happened to his daughter. And that they would actually catch someone. So they book Wells into the county jail. And he's, like I said, charged with murder and sexual battery. He was actually due to be in court on April 8th of 2020. But he took his own life in his jail cell days before. Coward. He was found hanging in his cell in the early morning hours on April the 2nd of 2020.

SPEAKER_00 22:27

I got caught, so I'm gonna kill myself so I don't have to go through all this stuff. Right. Right.

SPEAKER_01 22:31

Which they said like initially, because you know, you go before the court within days when it's something like that, so that you can say if you're guilty, not guilty, whatever.

SPEAKER_02 22:41

Right, right.

SPEAKER_01 22:42

And there's an article that said he was saying he wasn't guilty. And that was like March 24th, I want to say, of 2020, and he's like, not guilty. I'm like, you just literally got arrested and told the cops,

Arrest, Confession, And Fallout

SPEAKER_01 22:55

yeah, I did it. Right. And then admitted it. Not guilty. And then you kill yourself.

SPEAKER_00 23:00

So well, I mean, at least some sort of justice came about and got some answers.

SPEAKER_01 23:10

I was like, I don't know how I'd feel about that. Yeah. I'd be like, you saved there's like you can read comments on stuff where people are like, uh way to go, Daniel. Thanks for saving the taxpayer money. And I'm just going, geez. I'm not saying that, like, I get it. Yeah. Because he did something horrible. But at the same time, I'm like, I feel like, I don't know, maybe that I don't know. I guess here's my confusion. Yeah. I might want to sit through the court stuff and hear what happened, especially 35 years later when I thought this was never gonna come to an end.

SPEAKER_00 23:51

Right. So, you know, you took that away from her family. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 23:56

But also you took her and now you took away their chance to to understand what the heck happened. But but at least he was caught. Yeah. At least they figured it out. And there's no doubt with that matching DNA that that was him and he was guilty.

SPEAKER_00 24:14

Well, that's just like your Shandra May case, you know. Yeah. And it came to uh, oh, he died before he got to go to trial. So it's still a little punch in the gut, right? It is. It is.

SPEAKER_01 24:29

Yeah, a long time coming. Waited all that time for that, and that's the end. Yeah. So yeah. So nothing too uh too unusual because usually it's like a Florida man got a popsicle stuck in his ear hole.

SPEAKER_00 24:49

Let's take it somewhere else. Wait for it to melt, bro. Right. I watched the like it'll roll around on like TikTok or reels or something, like the nurses, the ER nurses, and they're like, don't.

SPEAKER_01 25:07

Holding something in their hand, don't. Don't. Yeah. It's crazy looking. It is. So not one of those kooky Florida man stories, but Florida man nonetheless. Yes, yeah, still, still bad. Yeah. Happy that he was caught, not happy that he killed himself. But yeah. Tis what it is.

SPEAKER_00 25:38

And we hope that, you know, the creator of our wonderful, wonderful me like the best theme music. Yeah, best theme music. Ever made. I was lost for words. It's so good. Patty sells that up. Hope she has a wonderful New Year's as well. Yeah. And have fun doing whatever you're doing tonight. Yeah. I think is she

Family Reactions And Lost Years

SPEAKER_00 26:00

playing with Little Orphan Annie? I think one of the bands that she Oh, Orphan Annie, yeah. Or Orphan Annie, not Little Orphan, Orphan Annie, sorry. I saw some stuff pop up and I didn't have time to look at it. And I was like, oh, I don't know. Maybe she's doing like a little New Year's Eve bash. Yeah. Because she has an amazing singing voice. She do. Yep.

SPEAKER_01 26:20

And she doesn't sing in our theme music, but you know.

SPEAKER_00 26:25

Maybe one day.

SPEAKER_01 26:27

Maybe we'll get her to do like a revision. Yeah. Make us a song, Patty. We'll see. You know, after we start making money. Yeah. So we can afford it.

SPEAKER_00 26:39

And you know how we could make money is if people like and share and comment and do all those things that we beg you literally every to do. We're on our knees. Right. And you're thinking, you know what? Somebody else will do it. They won't. You do it.

SPEAKER_01 26:58

Yes. It is in your hands. Right. Yours alone. Yeah. It's like the never-ending story. It is your responsibility. Only you can save us. Right.

SPEAKER_02 27:14

Say my name.

SPEAKER_01 27:16

To everyone you know. Right. Exactly. The name of the podcast, not necessarily my name.

SPEAKER_00 27:21

But it's just what that one little click or like or share. Like, you know, even though it's a good thing. It does make a big difference. If you have a TikTok, like sh share it there. Like repost it. Just hit the repost button. That's all you gotta do.

SPEAKER_01 27:35

That's it.

SPEAKER_00 27:35

All you gotta do. Yep.

unknown 27:38

Yep.

SPEAKER_01 27:39

And you can email us if you'd like to suggest a case or just say hi. Yeah. Hold my sweet tea podcast at gmail.com.

SPEAKER_00 27:51

We would love some suggested cases. We would love some listener cases. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 27:56

If you guys know somebody, you know some case that's not getting a lot of attention and you want to share it with us because you want us to share it.

SPEAKER_00 28:04

Yeah. Please do. Well, just like, you know, our friend Joelle, she had posted um and I posted it on our Facebook page. A friend of hers in Oklahoma, her daughter went missing and they did find her and everything. But she and she let me know. She's like, they found her. But I reposted it on our podcast Facebook page because you know it's it's missing person. Anything like that. If you need us to advocate for you, like we and let us get it out there, we'll do that. Yeah, we'll help push it around. If you're you know desperately looking for someone, someone's missing, let us know. Reach out, send us what you got. I mean, it's not like we're going to like billions of people, but like it just takes one person. Right.

SPEAKER_01 28:48

Every little bit helps. Every little bit helps for sure. Yep. And like we know other people that we can send it to also that will share it as well. I mean, we will help spread

Suicide Before Trial And Mixed Feelings

SPEAKER_01 29:00

it, that's for sure.

SPEAKER_00 29:01

Absolutely. I mean, we have 36,000 followers on our TikTok, so somebody's gonna see it.

SPEAKER_01 29:08

Somebody will see it, somebody will know something. Somebody come get her.

SPEAKER_00 29:14

Yeah. But anyway, wonderful New Year's Day. Yes. Cause, you know.

SPEAKER_01 29:25

Because the rest of the year is gonna be cruel. No, I'm gonna be our predictions for the new year. We don't know.

SPEAKER_00 29:31

Buckle up, Butterkill. Every year is so different. Right. But hold my sweet tea, as always, is a drunken bee production. You guys remember to stay safe out there, especially with you know, fireworks. Don't blow your hand off. Yeah, don't do that. And please be considerate of people around you that have PTSD and dogs and pets that have PTSD and anxiety. Yeah. And just because we're dipping doesn't mean you can't keep zipping. Bye.