DVI News 26 March 2012
27/Mar/2012
Bus plunges into canal, 14 kids killed20 March 2012. Pakistan.
At least 14 children were killed and 21 injured when a school bus lost control and plunged into a canal in Andhra Pradesh’s Khammam district on Tuesday.
The police said the bus belonged to LV Reddy School, a private school, about 280 km north-east of Hyderabad and was on its usual round of dropping off the children at their respective villages after the morning classes.
According to the preliminary reports, the bus was carrying 35 students and plunged into the canal shortly after noon.
http://www.hindustantimes.com/
Ellen’s Life in the Morgue
21 March 2012. Australia
If TV programs are any barometer, our appetites for gory crime, morbid morgues, forensic investigation and dissected bodies is unquenchable.
It's a fascination Rebecca Ellen is all too familiar with in her role as mortuary technician at the Victorian Institute of Forensic Medicine.
For 18 years the mother of two, from Tarwin Lower in South Gippsland, has been working with the state's own CSI-style experts, helping to solve suspicious deaths.
While the 37-year-old's job is to assist a pathologist in autopsy with dissection, helping to investigate deaths reported to the Coroner, the role has also taken her to Thailand to help with victim identification for the Boxing Day tsunami, as well as the Bali bombing and most recently on our own shores, Black Saturday bushfires.
"The role requires you are clinically minded and so you do lose sensitivity. We are very respectful and careful, but I see the body as a thing. What I'm sensitive to is the needs of the family - I feel sad for people at home waiting to find out what happened to their loved one," she says.
Rebecca says the Bali and Thailand operations and particularly Black Saturday were highly pressured.
"It is confronting and more complex, as I co-ordinate victim identification rather than just assisting the pathologist.”
"There is pressure to get it done well and quickly. People want the bodies of their family members back."
http://www.weeklytimesnow.com.
Mathura-Kasganj Express rams into passenger van, claims 16 lives
21 March 2012. India.
Munne Khan, 40, allegedly took his life on Monday. The daily wage earner's family was all the more shocked because there was no reason for Khan to kill himself. They hoped that a post-mortem would reveal the reason behind Khan's death in Uttar Pradesh's Hathras district.
A day after, his family and some other residents of Sathia village in Sasni tehsil, left for Kasganj to collect Khan's body after the post-mortem anxious to know the reason behind his death.
But tragedy struck en route. At an unmanned level crossing near the Medu railway station in Hathras, the Mathura-Kasganj Express rammed into the van Khan's relatives were travelling in.
The van was thrown high into the air on impact and hit a tree. As many as 16 people were crushed to death while four were hospitalised.
"The van was carrying 20 passengers, all from the same village," Chandra Prakash, Hathras superintendent of police, said.
http://indiatoday.intoday.in/
Achter de schermen van het Disaster Victim Identification
Behind the scenes of the Disaster Victim Identification
21 March 2012. Belgium
Twenty years ago the Herald of Free Enterprise capsized off Zeebrugge. There then came to 193 people. The Disaster Victim Identification team, which had barely two months existed was immediately put into practice for which the paper was founded: to identify the mutilated bodies of accidents, catastrophes and disasters. As coordinator of the DVI team awards Superintendent Dirk Maes us a glimpse behind the scenes of this support service within the federal police, which by its international operation is closely linked with Interpol.
The mission of the DVI team of Dirk Maes consists of identifying the remains of the victim to give back to the relatives. That way they get the chance to say goodbye, which is very important in their grieving process.
http://www.nieuwsblad.be/
Jacksonville house fire kills family of five
22 March 2012. USA.
A maintenance man at a Jacksonville duplex discovered Thursday morning five bodies of people who apparently died from carbon monoxide poisoning as a result of a small kitchen fire early Thursday morning or late Wednesday night.
Jim Durham, city administrator, said a neighbour had been complaining about the smells coming from the duplex next door at 3600 Max Howell Road in Jacksonville and Jacksonville fire and police showed up this morning about 6 a.m. to check out the area and found nothing out of the ordinary.
When the lady next door continued to call 911, firefighters knocked down the door and found the grisly scene inside.
Names are still being held pending notification of the next-of-kin, but Durham said firefighters found five bodies — a mother, a teenager and three small children of ages ranging from 3 to 5.
http://www.pulaskinews.net/
Speciale eenheden geven demonstratie
Special Units Give Demonstration
22 March 2012. Holland.
In the barracks of the federal police in Etterbeek, the special units of the federal police (CGSU) celebrated their 40-year anniversary. That happened in the presence of Federal Minister of the Interior Joëlle Milquet. The attendees were given a demonstration of the intervention unit of the CGSU, including the Disaster Victim Identification team.
In the eighties the first negotiators went to work at the CGSU and expanded the role of the units also cover surveillance and arrest of suspects. In the early nineties were the Under Cover Team DVI and housed in special units.
http://www.standaard.be/
Seven Dismembered Bodies Found in Central Mexico
22 March 2012.
Mexican police found seven dismembered bodies hidden in barrels and a sack inside a burnt-out SUV in the central city of Metepec, officials said.
Mexico state Attorney General Alfredo Castillo Cervantes confirmed the grisly discovery Wednesday morning, although he said authorities have not identified the victims and did not provide more information.
He also did not confirm press reports that a message left alongside the bodies indicated they were members of a police force in that state.
http://www.laht.com/article.
Karadzic Challenges Forensic Expert on Srebrenica
23 March 2012.
Former Bosnian Serb president Radovan Karadzic this week challenged the findings of a forensic expert whose organisation was tasked with counting and identifying human remains recovered from mass graves after the 1995 Srebrenica massacre.
Prosecution witness Thomas Parsons is currently the director of forensic sciences at the International Commission on Missing Persons, ICMP, and previously worked for the United States army in its DNA identification laboratory. He has testified in two other Srebrenica-related trials at the Hague tribunal.
The ICMP, headquartered in the Bosnian capital Sarajevo, was established to support the Dayton Peace Agreement, which ended the conflict in Bosnia and Hercegovina in 1996. It is currently the biggest forensic human identification programme in the world, the witness said.
ICMP’s list of victims found in and around Srebrenica had been entered into evidence, but had not been made public because some of the victims’ families had not yet been informed about the identification of their relatives, the prosecution told the court.
Karadzic's legal advisor Peter Robinson protested against the this list still being subject to confidentiality, and said this should be lifted so that the ICMP’s findings could be in the public domain.
“Once the identity of these persons is made public, than someone who is now alive and well and living in Salt Lake City could call in and say that he is alive, rather than being considered a victim”, Robinson told judges.
http://iwpr.net/report-news/
Middle Eastern immigrants bodies buried
23 March 2012. Indonesia.
53 bodies immigrants from the Middle East (Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan), victims Barokah boat that sank in the Prigi, Race, East Java, Indonesia on December 17, 2011 which was buried on Saturday, March 23, 2012 in Putat Jaya general Cemetery, Surabaya.
All bodies put in a huge grave, 17x17 meters. In each case given a tombstone that reads the identification numbers by Disaster Victim Identification Police Team in East Java.
http://www.demotix.com/news/
This news link has a series of photos of DVI Indonesia working on this operation
55 Jenazah Imigran Gelap Dimakamkan Massal
Bodies of 55 Immigrants Buried in Mass Grave
23 March 2012. Indonesia.
A total of 55 bodies of illegal immigrants from the Middle East who drowned in the waters of the Prigi Coast, Terri, East Java at the end of 2011, were buried in mass graves at the General Cemetery (TPU) Putat Jaya Village, District Sawahan, Jakarta, on Friday.
Dozens of bodies were shipped from East Java Police Bhayangkara Hospital in 18 vehicles with police escort. In the TPU, the bodies are buried in a grave measuring 20x30 meters.
Dokkes Head of East Java Police, Police Commissioner Budiono said the funeral had to be done. The Disaster Victim of Identification (DVI) Regional Middle East Java Police are continuing their identification efforts for 3 a further months which was the maximum. '' It is not yet generating significant identity because of the lack of supporting data,'' he said.
http://regional.kompas.com/
Divers find five more bodies on shipwrecked Costa Concordia two months after it ran aground
23 March 2012. Italy.
Divers yesterday five more bodies in the shipwrecked Costa Concordia more than two months after it ran aground leaving 30 people dead.
Officials said the three bodies had been located using a mechanical robot and they were found between the hull of the ship and the reef that it was resting on after striking rocks just hours after leaving on a Mediterranean cruise.
Another two were later discovered under deck three and were wearing lifejackets.
Civil protection chief Franco Gabrielli, who is in charge of the recovery operation, said:'The relatives of the people who are still missing have been informed of the discovery of the bodies. The position where they have been located means that it will take several days to recover them.'
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/
Seven people are dead in house fire
24 March 2012. USA.
Seven people are dead after a house fire in Charleston early Saturday morning, according to firefighters. The fire started about 3:30 a.m. on Arlington Avenue.
Firefighters say there was a child's slumber party at the house.
No word on the ages of those who died in the fire.
http://www.wsaz.com/home/
UPDATE: Eight people are dead in house fire
24 March 2012. USA.
The city of Charleston is investigating one of the worst fires in the city's history that killed eight people, including six children.
The fire started about 3:30 a.m. Saturday at a home on Arlington Avenue on the city's west side. Firefighters believe the fire started in a front room on the first floor.
Charleston Mayor Danny Jones held a news conference Saturday afternoon along with several other city officials, including police and fire investigators.
All six of the victim's names were released during the news conference.
http://www.wsaz.com/home/
UPDATE: Nine Dead in House Fire, Community Supporting Victims' Family
25 March 2012. USA.
The death toll from a house fire in Charleston has now risen to 9.
Seven-year-old Timothy Bryan Camp was taken off of life support between 8:30 and 9:00, Sunday morning.
Alisha Carter-Camp, Alex Seal, Keahna Camp, Jeremiah Camp, Elijah Scott, Emanuel Jones, and twins Kiki and Gigi were also killed when a fire broke out at a house on Arlington Avenue about 3:30 Saturday morning.
Alisha and Alex were the only two adults. The children's ages ranged from 18 months to eight years
http://www.wsaz.com/home/
19 Dead as Bus Plunges into Ravine west of Algeria
25 March 2012.
Nineteen people were killed in northwestern Algeria early Sunday when the bus they were riding plunged into a ravine, APS reported.
30 people were injured in the accident, which occurred near the city of Tiaret at around 2:00 am
http://www.echoroukonline.com/
15 dead, 28 injured in Nyanga bus crash
25 March 2012. Zimbabwe
Fifteen people were killed and 28 injured on Sunday after a bus veered off the road and overturned at an accident black spot in Nyanga, eastern Zimbabwe.
Twelve people died on the spot while three others died upon admission at Regina Coeli Mission Hospital, said Manicaland police spokesman Assistant Inspector Enock Chishiri.
http://www.newzimbabwe.com/
Bodies of 10,000 Victims of Violence in Mexico Unidentified
25 March 2012.
Nearly 10,000 bodies of victims of organized crime-related violence, including Central American and Mexican migrants, remain unidentified in Mexico, activists told the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, an autonomous organ of the Organization of American States.
That figure includes 8,800 victims who had not been identified in Mexico through April 2011 and another 1,200 whose bodies were recovered between 2006 and 2011 in 310 clandestine graves nationwide, according to the Foundation for Justice and the Democratic Rule of Law, a non-governmental organization.
The foundation’s director, Mercedes Doretti, presented those figures Friday to the IACHR in a hearing in Washington, in which several NGOs denounced Mexico’s lack of efficiency in searching for and identifying Central American migrants who went missing in that country while en route to the United States.
The NGOs suspect that many of these missing individuals are among the 1,200 people found over the past six years in the clandestine graves.
http://www.laht.com/article.
(Tags: dvi)