Content Warning: This story includes references to suicide. If you need help, call the suicide and crisis lifeline in your area.
In 2021, a An unidentified black woman committed suicide after jumping from the Brooklyn Bridge. She wore bright pink nail polish, a pink piercing in her left eyebrow, and several tattoos, all distinguishing features that should have made her easier to identify. Two years later, his identity is still unknown.
The tragedy of unidentified bodies is something Rionna Lee has thought about for years. Her mother would transport human remains to New York’s chief medical examiner’s office and bring home morbid stories. One of them, Lee recalled, involved a man who was hit by an MTA train. “One of the things that struck me was the condition of his remains, which were scattered across the railroad tracks,” says Lee, 24, who now lives in Kingston, Pennsylvania. It upset her to think about the families who would have to identify their loved ones – even more so later, when she learned that some human remains would never be identified.
There are an average of 4,400 new unidentified bodies per year in the United States, and a total of 600,000 people missing across the country. Some of these cases are collected in databases, such as the National Missing and Unidentified Persons System (NamUs), which helps medical examiners, coroners, law enforcement officers and members of the public to resolve missing, unidentified and unclaimed cases across the country. The true scale of the problem is unknown, because the available data on the average number of unidentified bodies comes from a 2004 census. Only 10 states have laws requiring records to be filed in NamUs, meaning that many Reports are voluntary.
As he reviewed the cases — including that of the woman with the pink nail polish — Lee noticed a pattern of which cases were solved and which were not. The deciding factor was often money. Funding from private donors, sponsorship, and public support have given law enforcement access to cutting-edge technology, such as Othram, a forensic genetics company, which has played a central role in solving several high-profile cases. Those that were not resolved were not resourced. Often, they belonged to marginalized groups. Lee, who identifies as Black and LGBTQ+, felt the need to raise awareness among neglected members of society, those whose deaths often go unnoticed: transients, racial minorities, drug users and members of the LGBTQ+ community .
Lee created a TikTok to try to raise awareness. After a few false starts, it went viral, attracting 128,000 subscribers. She created a Facebook group – Thee Unidentified & Unsolved – which now has 39,000 members, many of whom work together to solve unidentified and unsolved cases. Thee Unidentified & Unsolved is one of many volunteer social media communities filling a void left by the American state, a void that is worsening due to the overlapping crises of poverty, fentanyl, and public funding shortfalls. Now, with AI image recognition more readily available, volunteers have new tools to help them identify the deceased. This brings new issues around privacy and consent, but community members say their work brings closure to families. “I believe everyone starts with a name,” says Lee. “I believe everyone should be able to leave this earth in peace with their name.”
