Contribution of forensic anthropology to the administration of justice

GARCÍA MANCUSO, ROCÍO

La Plata

Seminario; 3rd Iberoamerican Seminar on Forensic Geosciences; 2017

International Union of Geological Sciences

Argentinean forensic anthropology is worldwide known because of its participation in the investigation of the cases of disappeared people under the last military government. But the challenge that forensic anthropology is facing today, is to integrate in the forensic investigation team of specialist from many different scientific fields as well as legal and law enforcement specialists in order to solve actual cases. Forensic goal is to identify the remains and to determine the circumstances of the unexplained death, and in this context, anthropologists are fundamental in the study of totally or partially skeletonized remains but also in cases where remains were altered by extraordinary conditions, such as fire, dismemberment or high-impact trauma. Part of the analysis that the forensic anthropologist can do is identifying the circumstances that lead to the discovery of the remains and determine what has happened to them since death. For that, gathering information at the recovery site is essential to help determine if the body moved or not, the time elapsed since death and indications of a trauma that may have occurred before, at or after death.As the main goal is to determine the identity of the person and to reconstruct the events surrounding his or her death, forensic anthropologists assess major biological characteristics of the remains. The first assessment that needs to be done when working with very incomplete and deteriorated remains is to define if they are bones and if they are human. In a second step, the remains themselves and context where they were found can help to determine if they are modern or not, this means that the remains could belong to a recently deceased person of forensic importance or to ancient populations from an archeological site. When the remains are human and recent, the assessment of major biological characteristics, such as age, sex and stature, help focus the investigation on specific groups. After that, individual biological characteristics, such as pattern of dental restoration, evidence of previous trauma and medical conditions, or unusual biological characteristics could help reaching personal identification.Considering that the finding of remains suspected of being human set in motion the entire justice system and a lot of employees and professionals get involved in the resolution of the cases, forensic anthropology can make a huge contribution to the administration of justice in recent are cases suggesting the closure or derivation of those cases that are not of forensic importance and the continuation of the trial of the worthy ones.