Forensic centre- body missing

Last week, it was discovered that the decomposed body of a man found stuffed in a barrel in San Fernando late last year was missing. No one at the mortuary could shed any light on how the body disappeared. This is not the first time a body has disappeared from the Centre. Sources told Sunday Newsday there have been several cases in which skeletal remains have gone missing. Last November 23, the charred and decomposed body of Rudolph Sammy, an employee of the San Fernando City Corporation, was discovered stuffed in a barrel outside his San Fernando home. Relatives had reported him missing on November 16. Several persons were questioned but no one arrested for that murder.

Then on November 30, just eight days after Sammy’s body was found, the decomposed

body of Peter Samaroo was also discovered stuffed in a barrel outside his Skinner Street,

San Fernando home only a few feet away from where Sammy’s body was found. Samaroo lived in an apartment next to the one occupied by Sammy.

Last week, Homicide officers went to the Forensic Science Centre to arrange for DNA tests on the two bodies so that they could be positively identified and to determine the cause of death. It was then that they discovered that one of the bodies was missing. One of the bodies was found intact in one of the freezers, but there was no tag on the body to identify it.

Homicide sources told Sunday Newsday they are depending on X-rays and dental records to identify the bodies. They said when the two bodies were found last year, they followed the proper procedures by entering all the information into a book at the Forensic Science Centre.

The bodies were received by a doctor at the facility and officers have copies of records showing when the bodies arrived at the facility. Numbers were assigned to the corpses and these were entered into books at the Centre. Sources told Sunday Newsday that bodies at the Forensic Science Centre are not tagged. Well-placed sources said the removal of the bodies from the facility are not properly supervised and slip-ups can occur very easily. Funeral agencies are contracted to dispose of unclaimed bodies. The undertakers remove the bodies for cremation or burial, then submit claims for the service and are paid. There is no time frame for keeping bodies at the facility in cases where murder is suspected. Officials can order pathologists to carry out autopsies if no one comes forward to identify remains. In instances where freezers at the Centre malfunction, the Centre can dispose of bodies which have been in cold storage for quite a while. Homicide officers are expected to go to the facility this week with relatives of Samaroo and Sammy so that blood samples can be taken from them.

These will be used in DNA tests to determine which body is missing. Only a parent or sibling or the deceased can give blood for DNAtests for identification purposes. Sunday Newsday was told that a report on the disappearance of the body has been forwarded to Arlette Lewis, Director of the Forensic Science Centre. Lewis was unavailable for comment on the matter.

Yesterday, Junior Minister of National Security Fitzgerald Hinds told Sunday Newsday he had no knowledge of bodies missing from the Forensic Science Centre. “The only person who can comment sensibly and accurately on that allegation is the Director of the Forensic Sciences Centre,” he said.