title: Osteometric sorting of skeletal elements from a sample of modern Colombians: a pilot study.
abstract: The Colombian armed conflict has been catalogued not only as the longest civil war in the western hemisphere, but also as having one of the highest indexes of missing persons. Among the several challenges faced by forensic practitioners in Colombia, the commingling of human remains has been recognised as one of the most difficult to approach. The method of osteometric sorting described by Byrd and Adams and Byrd (2008) has proven relevant as a powerful tool to aid in the reassociation process of skeletal structures. The aim of this research was to evaluate the three osteometric sorting models developed by Byrd (2008) (paired elements, articulating bone portions and other bone portions) in a sample of modern Colombian individuals. A set of 39 linear measurements was recorded from a sample of 100 individuals (47 females and 53 males aged between 20 and 74 and 18 and 77 years, respectively), which was used to create a reference sample database. A different subset of eight individuals (five females aged between 23 and 48 years, and three males aged between 27 and 43 years) was employed to randomly create six small-scale commingled assemblages for the purposes of testing the osteometric sorting models. Results demonstrate that this method has significant potential for use in the Colombian forensic context.
authors.affiliation: Centre for Anatomy and Human Identification, University of Dundee, MSI/WTB/JBC Complex, Dow Street, DD1 5EH, Dundee, Scotland, UK.
authors.forename: Juan Manuel Guerrero
authors.initials: JM
authors.lastname: Rodríguez
authors.affiliation: Centre for Anatomy and Human Identification, University of Dundee, MSI/WTB/JBC Complex, Dow Street, DD1 5EH, Dundee, Scotland, UK. l.hackman@dundee.ac.uk.
authors.forename: Lucina
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Hackman
authors.affiliation: Departamento de Antropología, Universidad Nacional de Colombia, Avenida Carrera 30 # 45, Bogotá, Colombia.
authors.forename: Wendy
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Martínez
authors.affiliation: Instituto Nacional de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses / Facultad de Medicina, Universidad Antonio Nariño, Carrera 3 este # 47A-15, Bogotá, Colombia.
authors.forename: César Sanabria
authors.initials: CS
authors.lastname: Medina
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D001842:Bone and Bones / Q000033:anatomy & histology*; D003105:Colombia; D005260:Female; D018732:Forensic Anthropology / Q000379:methods*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D015233:Models, Statistical; D010865:Pilot Projects; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: Armed conflict; Colombia; Commingled human remains; Forensic anthropology; Osteometric sorting