Alanah Buck^1
1PathWest

HIGs and IGGs: A Cold Case and Forensic Genealogy Approach to Unidentified Human Remains
Mortuaries in Australia have a number of long term unidentified human remains (UHRs).  The long term post mortem interval often makes these types of cases very hard to identify, with conventional methods of identification having limited success.  To improve the identification success rate, a Human Identification Group (HIG) with a ‘cold case’ approach was implemented in WA in 2010.  This has resulted in a greatly improved success rate for identification.  The introduction of Investigative Genetic Genealogy (IGG) into this approach has provided a powerful tool for the identification of the most difficult of long term unidentified remains.  As a result of the combination of the HIG and IGG approach, there has been an increase in the rate of successful identification of WA’s longest, and previously unidentifiable, human remains.