Bones lost in Missing Persons Unit bungle: whistleblower
A former NSW Police officer says she was forced to leave the job after raising red flags about the problematic Missing Persons Unit in 2014, after discovering some unidentified bones at the morgue had been wrongly disposed of and some police records for unidentified remains were often non-existent.
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A former senior police officer has exposed serious failings in how missing person cases are investigated, including allegations bones were wrongly disposed of.
Victoria Beresford, who reviewed the Missing Persons Unit in 2014, has spoken for the first time about her discoveries.
Her review, and two others, were undertaken following criticism from coroners about how missing person investigations are handled, including that families lived in false hope because unidentified remains weren’t matched against long-term cases.
It wasn’t until late last year that the MPU underwent a shake-up and was replaced.
“The new Missing Persons Registry — a stand-alone investigative unit, reporting directly to the State Crime Command’s Director of Crime Operations — has since been formed to rectify past problems and create solutions for now and into the future,” a police spokesman said.
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In her review Ms Beresford found cases sat on shelves for years without being looked at, staff were “dedicated but burnt out” and police records for unidentified remains at the morgue were often non-existent.
She said she was told some unidentified bones at the morgue had been wrongly disposed of.
“I have to say, I thought this was appalling. How long have people known about this problem and how long has MPU been trying to address this and got no traction?”
In 2014, according to Ms Beresford’s report, there were 250 boxes of unidentified remains in the morgue, including 10 sets of bones that belonged to children.
In another revelation, dozens of anthropologist reports compiled were deemed useless because the ages of bones were incorrectly estimated.
She claims interest in changing the way missing person cases were handled waned despite her report.
She believes police should have a legal duty of care to victims such as missing people and domestic violence victims.
“There is no duty of care — if there was, they couldn’t sweep these problems under the carpet,” she said.
Replying to the allegations, a Forensic and Analytical Science Service spokeswoman said: “While we can’t speak on behalf of former employees, we can confirm the remains stored in our forensic medicine facility are either returned to their families where possible or respectfully disposed of following completion of investigations with consent from Police and the Coroner.”
Originally published as Bones lost in Missing Persons Unit bungle: whistleblower