Practicing Forensic Anthropology

The problem of missing, endangered, and unidentified persons is increasingly approached through a human rights model with successful outcomes. Contexts vary from international investigations into war crimes, genocide, and extrajudicial killings to American “cold cases.” In all these examples, anthropologists play critical roles such as searching for clandestine graves, crime scene recovery, human identification, interviewing witnesses, repatriation, public education, and testifying in court. To successfully identify unknown persons, key questions about human variation and biology are essential. For example, can ancestry be reliably estimated? What are the ramifications of estimating the biological profile of an unknown person without appropriate references samples? Does the variation occur because of inherent genetic variation or environmental conditions? Given the potential variation that exists, what are the implications of using standard calibrations across populations in criminal trials? Moreover, forensic anthropologists today work in diverse cultural and legal environments. How do the roles of forensic anthropologists differ in diverse legal settings? The current practice of forensic anthropology ranges from field to lab to courtroom and has evolved as a discipline from what it was almost a century ago. The purpose of this volume is to explore the ways in which forensic anthropology intersects with current human right and humanitarian justice initiatives. The 11 papers in this series include a range of emerging new tools and approaches to human identification and the investigation of long-term missing and unidentified persons.

Practicing Forensic Anthropology:  A Human Rights Approach to the Global Problem of Missing and Unidentified Persons Erin H. Kimmerle  1 Forensic Anthropology in Long-Term Investigations: 100 Cold Years Erin H. Kimmerle  7 Where Are They? Missing, Forensics, and Memory Jose Pablo Baraybar and Rebecca Blackwell  22 Ignorance  Is Not Bliss: Evidence of Human Rights Violations from Civil War Spain Derek Congram, Ambika Flavel, and Kim Maeyama  43 Human Rights Investigations in Spain Roxana Ferllini  65 Intersite Analysis of Victims of Extra- and Judicial Execution in Civil War Spain: Location and Direction of Perimortem Gunshot Trauma Derek Congram, Nicholas Passalacqua, and Luis Rýos  81 Trauma Patterns in Cases of Extrajudicial Executions Erin H. Kimmerle and John Obafunwa  89 Toward Estimating Geographic Origin of Migrant Remains along the United States–Mexico Border M. Katherine Spradley  101 Craniometric Variation of Diverse Populations in Florida: Identification Challenges Within a Border State Meredith L. Tise, Erin H. Kimmerle, and M. Katherine Spradley   111 Application of Stable Isotope Forensics for Predicting Region of Origin of Human Remains from Past Wars and Conflicts Eric J. Bartelink,  Gregory E. Berg, Melanie M. Beasley, and Lesley A. Chesson  124 Georeferencing a Cold Case Victim with Lead, Strontium, Carbon, and Oxygen Isotopes George D. Kamenov, Erin H. Kimmerle,  Jason H. Curtis, and Darren Norris  137 Contributions of Radiocarbon  Analysis in Human Rights Investigations Douglas H. Ubelaker  155 Biosketches  165