In May and June of 1996, a forensic anthropology team from the C.A. Pound Human Identification Laboratory at the University of Florida identified 9 of 10 juveniles from the crash of ValuJet 592. The team relied primarily on a radiographic atlas developed and used by clinical practitioners to determine skeletal age. Postmortem radiographs of the juvenile victims were compared with radiographic standards to determine skeletal age. Skeletal age was then compared to a passenger list indicating the sex, weight, height, and chronological age of each individual. Tentative identifications based on the atlas method were organized into an exclusion matrix. Final identifications were based on this assessment in conjunction with other anthropological data such as appearance and fusion of ossification centers and estimation of stature.

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forensic anthropological tenets supported by William R. Maples, Ph.D. provide the bases for a case study from the C.A. Pound Human Identification Laboratory. Using a multidisciplinary team that included police investigators, pathologists, odontologists. entomologists, and anthrpologists, a biological profile and trauma analysis was constructed. Our analysis determined that the decedent was a middle-aged Hispanic male, approximately 5′6″–5′7″ in stature, who had died a minimum of three months before the discovery of his remains. Gross and microscopic analysis revealed 11 areas of sharp trauma to the skull and cervical vertebrae. To aid with analysis of the trauma, nonhuman trauma exemplars were created using a Tiger® rear flail mower of the make known to have been used at the scene where the remains were recovered. This use of nonhuman trauma exemplars proved to be essential in the effort to exclude the rear flail mower as the possible trauma agent.

The Food and Drug Administration does not require surgical sutures to be tracked by manufacturer, physician, or patient; thereby, surgical sutures have been of little use to forensic practitioners who are tasked with establishing a positive identification with biological evidence. This study demonstrates the investigative process used to pinpoint suture manufacturers by presenting a case where surgical sutures were a distinctive characteristic that aided in the positive identification of skeletal remains. The suture's manufacturer, construction material and structure, size, and medical use was determined by contacting a local surgical suture and orthopedic implant manufacturer and utilizing publicly available manufacturer websites, which provide catalogs and specific product details. This research was one of many lines of evidence used to establish the positive identification of a 47-year-old male.

By integrating osteological, taphonomic, archaeological and stable isotopic data, we test for cannibalism in the Lau Group, Fiji and discuss the potential underlying cause(s) and context(s) of this behaviour. First, we compare taphonomic and element representations of human skeletal material from two contexts in Fiji, examining human bone fragments from archaeological sites, including middens and burials in the Lau Island Group. Fourteen sites produced human remains. Only two of those sites included distinct human burial contexts, but in the remaining 12 sites, the human bone was recovered from middens or contexts where midden was mixed with possible secondary burials. A total of 262 number of identified specimens per species, representing an estimated 15 minimum number of individuals make up the Lau human assemblage. Second, we analysed bones contained in 20 individual human burials from four different sites that are housed at the Fiji Museum for comparative purposes. Third, we examine previously published stable isotopic (d 13 C, d 15 N) analysis of bone collagen to gauge protein consumption of likely cannibalised humans in midden contexts and potential cannibals from primary burials. We model a cannibalistic diet category within the context of isotopically measured Pacific Islands food groups and apply an isotopic mixing model to gauge plausible dietary contributions from six sources including human flesh. Isotopic mixing models of the Lauan samples illustrate a high diversity in reconstructed diets. The percent contribution of human flesh is low for all individual Lauans. We conclude that mortuary rituals evidenced by sharp-force trauma may suggest non-nutritive and non-violent practices that may have included the consumption of small amounts of human flesh.