CSI: UNT to Lend a Hand to Oklahoma

Medical examiner's office seeks help from university program to ID remains

The Oklahoma State Medical Examiner's Office has begun cataloguing all of its unidentified remains in hopes that a Texas university program may be able to use DNA to identify the dead.

Spokeswoman Cherokee Ballard says the medical examiner's office has found 125 cases involving unidentified remains but does not know how many have been subjected to DNA testing.

The office hopes a new relationship with the University of North Texas' Center for Human Identification will match some of the remains through a national database.

The center offers free DNA testing to law enforcement agencies and medical examiners.

Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation forensic expert J.D. Lindstrom says most cases referred to his agency are already sent to the identification center.

Copyright AP - Associated Press
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