Nearly five decades after a 1980 double murder, St. Petersburg Police used DNA technology to identify a previously unknown victim.

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. — Forty-six years after two men were gunned down inside a St. Petersburg motel, the last unidentified victim has been identified.

The St. Petersburg Police Department announced Friday that detectives identified the John Doe as 29-year-old Johnny Bradshaw of Tennessee.

On April 26, 1980, Bradshaw and Jack Roy Davis were staying at the Siesta Motel at 701 34th Street N. in St. Petersburg when they were shot in the head. 

Detectives quickly identified the suspects as Kyle Watson and his girlfriend, David Ann Thomas. According to police, the pair returned to Knoxville, Tennessee, where Thomas shot and killed Watson. Thomas later served prison time and has since died.

At the time of the murders, Davis was identified, but Bradshaw remained unknown.

In 2010, detectives exhumed Bradshaw’s body in an attempt to identify him, but that effort was unsuccessful.

Then, in 2023, cold case detective Wallace Pavelski sent new bone samples to a lab, Othram Labs, and they were able to get a full DNA profile.

Det. Pavelski was able to contact family members in Texas and California, including Bradshaw’s two sisters, who had been looking for him since 1980.

St. Petersburg police say this is the final unidentified John/Jane Doe on the department’s cold case list. 



Cold Case in pictures: The Siesta Motel 1980 double murder and John Doe’s identification