Identified! OH - Dayton, WhtMale skeletal remains, Jul'11 - Daniel Wells

The Montgomery County Coroner’s Office has put a face to the set of badly decomposed human remains discovered in the ravine of a small creek bed in west Dayton on July 29.

In a final identification effort, Ken Betz, director of the Montgomery County Coroner’s Office, hired forensic artist Joanna Hughes, based at the University of Tennessee, to create a likeness of the man’s face ...

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The man is described as a white male, 5’6” to 6’ tall, between the ages of 35 and 60, with small to medium build. The artist did not include a hairline on the facial reconstruction, because it’s an unknown factor.

“Since we don’t know, we didn’t want to put something in the hairline that could detract people from looking at his eyes, nose and mouth,” Betz said.

The victim was seated on a piece of dumped concrete — west of Westown shopping center — with his legs stretched in front of him. On the edge of the concrete, near the victim’s left hand, was an orange safety cap for a hypodermic syringe.

He wore a pair of gray, Columbia-brand cargo shorts, size small, dark socks and white gym shoes, size 9 1/2 along with a medium-size black and brown Puritan T-shirt. Investigators found a red and black Cincinnati Reds baseball cap near the body. The victim also had on a silver Armitron watch with a dark face, but carried no cellphone or wallet. A pair of blue-tinted sunglasses were tucked into his shirt.

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The Montgomery County Coroner's Office used DNA to identify Daniel Wells.

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