Lengthy, rbbm.
In 2010, skeletal remains of a murdered (and likely assaulted) woman were found in Manchester, UK. Will the UK permit advanced DNA testing to identify her?
dnasolves.com
Unfortunately, this is a different kind of story. There is no ending and
the “Angel of the Meadow” remains unidentified, not because of scientific limitation but because the UK is still working to develop a position on genealogical search for law enforcement investigations . Much like in the United States, there are so many unidentified victims in the UK and much like in the United States, these unidentified persons will often not be identified using traditional forensic testing alone. The UK allows “familial search”, but these comparisons are based on STRs. They utilize very few markers and can generally only detect an exact match, parent-child relationship, or sibling relationship. Investigators compared 400 missing persons without a match and this is a time-consuming and costly venture. I can only hope that in the future, there will be a chance to deploy modern DNA testing to help identify this woman and connect her back to family.
In the meantime, we teamed up with online advocate Al Ka and the Othram team helped fund a proper headstone for this unknown woman. The headstone was completed just recently, this year.
