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Macabre Web site feature helps identify bodiesMacabre Web site feature helps identify bodies

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PHOENIX — A macabre addition to the Maricopa County Medical Examiner's Office Web site is helping officials identify bodies.

The recently launched "unidentified persons search" includes information on nearly 200 unidentified corpses. Sometimes that information includes photographs and composite sketches.

Some of the cases date as far back as 1970, while the most recent body was found on Sept. 7.

Two people have been identified since the launch. One of them was a man who was hit by a car, and the other was a young woman who was found dead on a dirt road.

The bodies were identified when family members and friends gave the names of the dead after logging on to the Web site.

Nationwide, medical examiners and missing-persons organizations have used similar sites.

Authorities estimate that more than 40,000 bodies nationwide are unidentified.

Authorities say that in Maricopa County, the proximity to the Mexican border, coupled with homelessness, mental illness and substance abuse, can separate families and make it harder to identify loved ones when they die.

The office receives numerous calls from people looking for loved ones, said Suzi Dodt, an investigator with the Medical Examiner's Office.

In addition to photographs and sketches, the site provides information on distinguishing features, such as jewelry, tattoos or scars. Users can sort through cases that give the person's approximate age, the body's condition, where it was found and the probable time of death.

Less than half of the cases include photos.

Disclaimers on the county site warn that the images may disturb some viewers.

"People aren't accidentally going to come across disturbing pictures," Dodt said. "If people are out there on the Internet trying to find pictures of dead bodies, ours isn't the only site where they're going to find them."

Another Web site, Project EDAN, includes only composite sketches, said Todd Matthews, the site's founder.

The database, www. projectedan.us, includes information from 380 cases nationwide. "EDAN" stands for "Everybody Deserves a Name."

"We try to think of next of kin because (the image) burns in their minds," Matthews said. "To see (loved ones) in that state, it's disturbing. So you try to make that last memory as pleasant as possible."