Alice Mae Sullivan: After Nearly 40 Years, DNA Confirms Skull Found in 2004 Belongs to Missing TSU Student

On October 8, 2025, the Metro Nashville Police Department officially identified the owner of the human skull which were found in along Stokers Lane in North Nashville in  February 2004.

Police say they belong to Alice Mae Sullivan, a Tennessee State University student who disappeared in 1986.

“Continued follow-up on a missing persons investigation led to a piece of closure for the family of 20-year-old TSU student and mother, Alice Mae Sullivan,” the department shared in a statement.

The skull, according to police, showed no signs of trauma, but it was the only part of her remains ever found despite extensive searches in 2004.

Alice Mae Sullivan was just 20 years old when she disappeared without a trace. She was a sophomore business major at Tennessee State University and a young mother to a 3-year-old boy.

On the morning of August 28, 1986, Sullivan left her apartment at Town Terrace Apartments, where she lived with her boyfriend and son. 

She was expected to pick up her child from a babysitter later that day — but she never showed up, as per WKRN. 

Investigators confirmed she attended her morning classes and was last seen around 10 a.m. in a friend’s dorm room at Hankal Hall. 

Some witnesses also reported seeing her walking near the Gentry Center that same morning.

Her boyfriend contacted her parents the next day after she didn’t come home, and they immediately traveled from Gallatin to Nashville to report her missing.

“Alice was close with her parents, and they never believed she would leave without a word,” investigators previously said.

That day marked the beginning of a decades-long search — one that left a family and community desperate for answers.

The breakthrough came after forensic scientists at the University of North Texas Center for Human Identification used advanced DNA technology to analyze the skull found back in 2004.

On October 8, they confirmed the remains as belonging to Alice Mae Sullivan, finally giving her family the answers they had waited nearly four decades for.

The discovery also reignited attention to the three Tennessee State University students, who disappeared between 1986 and 1998, including Alice Mae Sullivan. 

Sullivan wasn’t the only TSU student to mysteriously vanish back then.

Just three years after her disappearance, Donald Johnson, another student, went missing in 1989. 

And in 1998, Marcus Rutledge, a senior, was reported missing after his girlfriend couldn’t reach him. His car was later found abandoned, and his dog left alone in his apartment — a sign that something was seriously wrong.

Despite the time that has passed, no suspects have been officially named in any of the three cases, but cold case detective say the investigations remain open.

Although Alice Mae Sullivan’s remains have been identified, her cause of death remains a mystery. The Metro Nashville Police Department’s Cold Case Unit is continuing to investigate, hoping to uncover what really happened to her that day in 1986.

Anyone with information is urged to contact the Metro Nashville Police Department at 615-862-8600 or Crime Stoppers at 615-742-7463.

For now, her family finally has part of the closure they’ve waited almost forty years for — but the search for justice is far from over.