Resolved VT - Burlington, Oakledge Park, WhtMale 18-99, UP12366, 3 January 2011 *Namus removed 2025*

[djanga]

Burlington ‘John Doe’ identified 15 years after skull fragment found

Fifteen years after a skull fragment was found in a Burlington park, investigators have now identified the man to whom it belonged.

www.wcax.com

In a release on Tuesday, the DNA Doe Project says they determined the skull fragment is from Arthur Weiss, an 87-year-old New York man. They say he was never a missing person, but that his ashes were scattered in Burlington’s Oakledge Park back in January 2011.

After the fragment was first found, police forensic work revealed it belonged to an adult white male who died between 1975 and 2011. But without other leads, the Burlington Police brought the case to the DNA Doe Project, which works with genealogists to solve cases.

They say a key clue -- Weiss’ Ashkenazi Jewish heritage -- helped them trace his DNA to a woman from Belarus, who had immigrated to the U.S. and turned out to be his mother.

Investigators later confirmed a friend of Weiss in Burlington scattered the cremains.

 

[Blurgle]

This seems...rather negligent, on the part of the crematorium. No shame to the family, LE, or the DDP, but cremains should be processed so as not to cause this kind of issue.

 

[Susikatze]

This seems...rather negligent, on the part of the crematorium. No shame to the family, LE, or the DDP, but cremains should be processed so as not to cause this kind of issue.

I wonder how they got DNA from cremains. Or the crematorium messed it up and left some body parts uncremated or just partially cremated. jikes.

Anyways, happy he got his name back - on Passover.

 

[The4TierBridge]

I wonder how they got DNA from cremains. Or the crematorium messed it up and left some body parts uncremated or just partially cremated. jikes.

Anyways, happy he got his name back - on Passover.

The only recovered remains in this case were a skull fragment about the size of a U.S. quarter coin (which is 24.3 mm in diameter). I don’t even know how the person who found the fragment recognized it was bone (or that it could have come from a person).

 

[Beekarina]

It is a highly unusual case and outcome, but also really interesting.

Maybe it was just the way the bone curved or something and the person who found it decided to err on the side of caution? I mean, in the end they were not wrong. It could have been found by someone with an interest or experience in forensics too.

The only downside is time and money spent that theoretically could have been put towards an actually missing person, but this is so incredibly unusual I don't see it happening again?