Renewed Hope for Lost and Found Persons

At last movement into the finalization of the NamUs - National Missing and Unidentified Persons System at www.NamUs.gov

In 2009 the dual database system integration will allow simultaneous searching of missing persons records against cases in the unidentified decedents database. The goal being to identify unidentified human remains and solve missing persons cases.

But a system can only do so much with the info available. When two cases are being compared for a match, a missing person to an unidentified person, there must be things to help identify.

If one case or the other lacks fingerprints, then no match can be made using fingerprints. If either case lacks a dental record, that leaves out a dental record match. Finally as a last resort the DNA comparison. Sadly there are cases of unidentified that were buried prior to DNA standard collection.

So in long term cases, the odds are against the system when the case files are full of blanks.

If you are the family member of a missing person, long term or short term, it's time to do all you can to enrich the case file. If you cannot gather dental records, there might be other means available. An x-ray of just about any other bone in the body can be of potential use in identification. So do not discount any detail that might seem too small to be of value.

A medical history of illness or disease can be of possible value. Better to bring too much info than to be left having too little or none.

At the University of North Texas - Center for Human Identification, two types of test kits for DNA are available to law enforcement, and the test are free.

One kit is designed for the medical examiner / coroner to collect a sample from an unidentified person for DNA extraction. The other kit is a family reference sample kit. If you are a blood relative of a missing loved one, it is possible to have a DNA sample reference taken to help identify a loved one in the unfortunate event they have become an unidentified decedent.

For more information -- visit www.NamUs.gov