Our Head of Identification helps resolve unidentified cases and enable publicity for long term missing persons. © Missing People
The Rufford Maurice Laing Foundation provided a grant of £10,000 in 2007/08 to support Missing People’s Head of Identification.
Identification is Missing People’s specialist service, provided free of charge, that supports police, coroners, hospitals and social services to resolve cases of unidentified people.
The service provides specialist forensic artwork, such as post mortem image enhancements and facial reconstructions to produce images of unidentified persons suitable for publicity, and also offers specialist age-progressions for long term missing persons, enabling Missing People to generate new publicity.
The worst part for families who experience someone going missing is the not knowing and although the vast majority of missing people return safe within 72 hours, thousands do not. Their Head of Identification can cross-check unidentified persons against Missing People’s extensive database and launched the first online database, accessible to the public, of unidentified persons at www.missingpeople.org.uk.
Missing People helps to resolve 70% of the cases it works on but unfortunately some missing people are found dead. A person may remain unidentified for any length of time due to lack of communication between authorities, misleading information (particularly about decomposed or skeletal remains) or if the person has not been reported missing. Their Head of Identification helps to establish the identity of that individual as quickly as possible through database searches, comparison with known cases, forensic artwork and publicity.
The Rufford Maurice Laing Foundation’s support helped Missing People to identify unidentified people, create new publicity for long term missing persons, support their families, and act as a key resource for public-sector agencies.
Visit the Missing People website.