WA - Unidentified Male: "Lyle Stevik", Grays Harbor, 17 Sept 2001 - #5

[dizzychick]

would someone humor me here and explain exactly how this isotope stuff works, I read it several times and it flew right over my pea brain. I do not understand this science, explain in simple English how a tooth can be analized to reveal where a person lived all their life? Thanks, it is interesting but hard for the simple minded like me LOL


" Teeth also consist of organic and inorganic materials, but unlike bone, once formed, dental enamel does not remodel. Consequently, teeth are very useful for determining the environment and conditions of an individual's early life. (i.e., when their teeth formed). In addition, comparisons of teeth and bone tissues in a single individual whether a person moved geographic locations since childhood: their teeth will show where they lived where they were young and their bones will show where they lived in the years before their death.""

 

[dizzychick]

would someone humor me here and explain exactly how this isotope stuff works, I read it several times and it flew right over my pea brain. I do not understand this science, explain in simple English how a tooth can be analized to reveal where a person lived all their life? Thanks, it is interesting but hard for the simple minded like me LOL


" Teeth also consist of organic and inorganic materials, but unlike bone, once formed, dental enamel does not remodel. Consequently, teeth are very useful for determining the environment and conditions of an individual's early life. (i.e., when their teeth formed). In addition, comparisons of teeth and bone tissues in a single individual whether a person moved geographic locations since childhood: their teeth will show where they lived where they were young and their bones will show where they lived in the years before their death.""

well im answering my own question LOL I found this video useful but still its hard for me to digest LOL this info :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UtdDPDVxvjY

 

[dotr]

https://attheu.utah.edu/facultystaff/isotope-sleuths/

ISOTOPE SLEUTHS

July 18, 2016

By Paul Gabrielsen

They say that dead men tell no tales. A University of Utah spin-off company begs to differ. Hair, teeth and bone all preserve a record of where a person’s been – often an invaluable boon to law enforcement with no other leads to go off of.

The company, IsoForensics, analyzes for slight variations in an organism’s chemistry that can give a clue to its recent environment. The versatile technique, called isotope analysis, has been used to crack cold cases, track counterfeit bills, combat post-9/11 terrorism and even trace the source of fast food. Because isotope analysis relies on chemistry common to all living things, the applications are endless.

Today, IsoForensics takes on many cases of “unidentified decedents,” human remains that haven’t been able to be identified by other means. “The fact that it’s an ongoing issue says something about how many unidentified decedent cases there are in the U.S.,” Chesson says.

Any available tissue can be analyzed, although the most common are bone, teeth and hair. Each portrays a different period of a person’s life. Teeth record the isotopic signature of where a person was living in their childhood and early adulthood. Bone, since it’s replaced by the body at a rate of about 10 percent a year, paints a broader picture of the past eight to 10 years of a person’s life.
“Your hair, since it’s continuously growing, it’s giving you that weekly, monthly record,” Chesson says. “Depending on the length of hair available we could reconstruct the last few months or the last couple of years of life.”
Hair records helped IsoForensics identify “Saltair Sally,” a woman’s body found near the Great Salt Lake in 2000. Using hair samples, IsoForensics looked at Sally’s recent travel history. “It’s often the most useful information we can provide in these cases,” Chesson says. “One of the first questions police ask is: are they local to the area? If they’re not local, then the next question is: Were they traveling and where were they traveling from?”


Samples for analysis in an autosampler tray.


Results suggested that Sally had recently visited the Pacific Northwest, a clue that eventually led to her identification as Nikole Bakoles in 2012. The company also helped crack the case of Mary Alice Willey, a California woman killed in 1971 but not identified until 2008, and recently delivered a major clue in a 1981 cold case from Ohio. The victim’s hair revealed a connection to North Texas, giving police a new place to start looking for leads.

rbbm.

 

[ilovepierre]

That’s how my brain is processing the isotopes. What am I missing? I feel like the isotopes literally say he’s been in every single region of the country, which could be extreme. But I’d really love if someone could ELI5 isotope analysis in general and in lyles case as well. I have to be missing something and I feel so dense.


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That's my thought as well.
I've seen isotope analysises done on other UID's and they've narrowed those ones down to a single State or two.
IMO, the isotopes found in Lyle are super common, making a specific location difficult to determine.

 

[neesaki]

Poor Lyle did a lot of traveling of the USA during his life,

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B1UpsPd0Du14MFVyTExMeGJYOFM4eGlOV1dOQ1NFTzVuZTZR/view

This is fascinating. Doesn’t seem to narrow it down a lot though, still tells us he wasn’t from the area he died in.

 

[neesaki]

I have a cousin who travels by Amtrak all over the country. And saw a movie recently about people who ride Amtrak all the time, a few seemed to spend more time on the train than at home, if they even had a home, idk. Could he have been doing this?

 

[ilovepierre]

It's possible.
Was there an Amtrak station around the hotel area?

 

[PaulR]

It's possible.
Was there an Amtrak station around the hotel area?

Closest Amtrak station would have been about 100 miles away near Olympia. It looks to be pretty far from the nearest bus depot.

 

[vulture]

He reminds me of the actor Richard Benjamin. Lyle strongly resembles my Dad, and when my Dad was younger he was sometimes asked for his autograph because people thought he was Richard Benjamin. As far as i know, my Dad's ancestry is German, French and a little English. There are rumors of Native American ancestry in the mix. Dad and I both have shovel-shaped incisors - he has four, I have two. My Dad's coloring is a little lighter than Lyle but he definitely has black hair, and it's wiry. My Dad is older but otherwise looks so much like Lyle that it's spooky! Nose is different though from profile. Dad's profile is almost exactly the same as Richard Benjamin.

 

[leilarose68]

Have you guys seen this incredible reconstruction of Lyle by /u/theidkid on reddit? She's very talented at photoshop and understanding light, etc. I would seriously recommend reading her comments/posts as well.

https://imgur.com/YwB4b7Z

 

[honesty]

That is an amazing reconstruction!


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[Skigirl]

This is fascinating. Doesn’t seem to narrow it down a lot though, still tells us he wasn’t from the area he died in.

Yeah, the isotope analysis isn't very useful in my opinion. He could have lived or grown up in almost any region of the country -- can't tell the difference between areas around the great lakes and Kentucky or North Carolina, and Arizona gets lumped in with the Pacific Northwest, etc.

 

[leilarose68]

That is an amazing reconstruction!


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This particular reconstruction really makes me feel that he's Balkan. She talked about how the lighting in the autopsy room was red so she adjusted his skin color based on that. She seems to have a lot of experience interpreting this kind of thing, very interesting.

 

[Roselvr]

Carl redid his recon yesterday because I noticed it wasn't signed. His hair is more accurate to the suicide pics

 

[Roselvr]

A guy named Eli made the attached image; he posted it on Carls FB photo of Lyle.

 

[tyrnill]

That one of him smiling kind of makes my heart ache.

 

[keeleydoll]

That one of him smiling kind of makes my heart ache.

Exactly. Even if he was estranged from his family, as a mother, I would rather know what happened than spend the rest of my life guessing and hoping.


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[leilarose68]

I thought that Lyle's hair was slicked back with sweat and/or gel?

 

[aThousandYearsWide]

I recently though of this and it might be a duh moment, but it's just I haven't really thought of this before. Maybe Lyle lost all that weight after becoming estranged from his family and they are looking for someone that looks completely different. What comes to mind is how actors gain or lose weight for a certain part. They look entirely different sometimes when it's extreme changes. Jared Leto once gained 60 something pounds for a role, and another role he also lost a ton to play an AIDS patient. In neither role did he look very much like himself.

Would his autopsy be able to tell exactly how he was able to lose his weight? Just a thought.

 

[keeleydoll]

I recently though of this and it might be a duh moment, but it's just I haven't really thought of this before. Maybe Lyle lost all that weight after becoming estranged from his family and they are looking for someone that looks completely different. What comes to mind is how actors gain or lose weight for a certain part. They look entirely different sometimes when it's extreme changes. Jared Leto once gained 60 something pounds for a role, and another role he also lost a ton to play an AIDS patient. In neither role did he look very much like himself.

Would his autopsy be able to tell exactly how he was able to lose his weight? Just a thought.

IIRC the assumption that he had lost weight was based on too large pants and a belt that had been used at larger spaces than he was wearing them on. There was a possibility of Russell’s sign on one hand which may indicate bulimia or possibly just a scrape in the process of healing. There were no notes stretch marks or loose skin that would indicate a fast weight loss. As a person contemporary in age to Lyle, nearly every guy I knew at that time wore pants several sizes too big. My husband in particular has a belt that was his granddad’s that he was given when he passed and it is worn on many of the holes because his granddad had had cancer and lost a lot of weight. I personally don’t think Lyle lost 40-60lbs in a short span of time because there would be very obvious physical indicators on his body not just ill fitting clothing.


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