290 unclaimed bodies since January, one of which is a 4-year-old girl
|Published
Elaine Hartzenberg points to where the body of the 4-year-old child who has yet to be claimed, was found. Filed image
A 4-year-old girl is one out of 290 unclaimed bodies which have been waiting to be identified at State mortuaries in the Western Cape since January.
Two weeks ago, the decomposing body of the child was found dumped, in a black bag, at a refuse dump in Fisantekraal.
To date, no one has claimed the body at the local State Forensic Pathology Services mortuary and police have yet to make an arrest.
The child has been described by community activists as having blonde-coloured braids.
According to Western Cape Department of Health, a total of 290 bodies have been unclaimed/unidentified between January 1 and April 25.
Out of that number, 215 have been unidentified for 90 days, 41 for 60 days and 24 for a 30-day period.
On average unidentified bodies can be released after admission up to 255 days while identified cases are 7.63 days.
They stated that a body is deemed unidentified after seven days and that the State could prepare for a pauper burial after 30 days if no DNA to fingerprints and sketches could identify the person and if all efforts from a police investigation via an address search led to a dead end.
They have now opted to retain the bodies in storage as long as they could with the help of new advanced forensic pathology storage facilities.
Mark Van Der Heever, the deputy director for communications for the Western Cape Health and Wellness explained: “A deceased that enters our system is deemed to be unidentified after seven days. It is at this stage that we then start following various processes to try to identify the deceased.
“Our process starts by taking the deceased’s fingerprints and checking the prints against the Criminal Record database to determine if the person has a criminal record and if so, the name and last known address.
“The address will be checked by the investigating officer at SAPS.
“If the address or name given was false, then we will send the fingerprints to the Department of Home Affairs, via SAPS, to check against the National Population Register.
“Once this information is received, the registered address will then be visited by the IO of the case. Should this not be successful, then we send in the deceased’s DNA to the SAPS Forensic Science Laboratory so that they can store it on their database for future reference. Only at this stage do we then apply to the municipality for a pauper burial.
“Due to the various processes mentioned above, these processes can take up to six months to a year depending on the investigating officer’s responsiveness.”
Fisantekraal community activist, Elaine Hartzenberg, who has been working closely with the police in the investigation of the 4-year-old confirmed that no one had claimed the child’s body.
The body was found dumped on April 10 at a refuse dump.
It had been taken to the dumping site by a teenage boy who had been asked by a female resident to empty her dirt bin, a task he had often done for her.
He told police he had not known that there was a body inside and was paid R20 by the woman.
The woman together with two others had been taken in for questioning and later released from police custody.
Hartzenberg said they were disturbed by the fact that the body had not been identified and told of how she began questioning residents whose child it was and if anyone knew the child.
“No one knew the child. I began walking around with pamphlets which were given by the police in the area.
“Police went to Philadelphia and others to the farms and no one has identified the child.
“Foreign nationals who lived in the backyard of where the bin was moved and we were informed that the police were in possession of their new address.
“We have no answers and no one has reported her missing.
“We appeal for the parents to come forward.
“As of April 27, the body had not been claimed, it is so unreal and very sad, how is it possible that no one has come to identify this child?”
Police spokesperson, Captain Frederick Van Wyk said there had been no arrests.
Van der Heever emphasised that often an artist’s impression of an unclaimed boy was not always reliable: “A process of facial reconstruction may also be utilised but this is a time-consuming process and thus not widely utilised.
“Each facility has photo albums of the persons that have not been identified, and this is available for the families to view when they wish to report a person as missing.”
He said much of the backlog of unclaimed bodies could be due to several migrant workers and travelling throughout the country or even sub-Saharan Africa, with minimal contact with their families, the reporting process is somewhat delayed, even up to a year or two.
He added due to the advanced storage facilities, they had no concerns with space and that often these persons were not registered on the National Population Register.