Chicago morgue 'lost mother's body for 14 months' while stuffed beyond capacity

The family of a missing Chicago woman whose body took over a year for a morgue to admit identification is suing behind claims they lost her among a pile of bodies stuffed over capacity. The body of Carmelita Johnson, 47, was recovered from a South Shore beach over 14 months ago but her family claim they were never notified by the Cook County medical examiner's office but instead tipped off by a police detective. 'It's devastating,' Ms Johnson's daughter Leslie Jackson told NBC Chicago this month.'A lot of things could have been prevented. We don't know the cause of death, but if the [Medical Examiner's] office had done their jobs, we could've had some type of closure,' she said. The suit follows leaks by morgue staff of photos showing hundreds of bodies stacked, some rotting for over a year in the facility, while a cooler stored nearly 500 others despite a capacity of 300, according to an anonymous source speaking to the Chicago Tribune. ...

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DNA profiling centre to be launched at AFMC

Lt Gen H Kakaria,Director General, Armed Forces Medical Services, will launch the DNA profiling centre at the AFMC on February 8 on the sidelines of the four-day 60th armed forces medical conference, which will begin in the city on February 7. Presently, the identity of dead armed forces personnel is established by examining personal belongings on the body, studying the identification marks, comparing photographs and others. However, these methods become futile when there is extensive mutilation, disfigurement and decomposition of the body, officers said. Such accidents happen when personnel are employed in hazardous tasks like bomb disposal, flying fighter planes, research in explosive materials as well as troops deployed in militancy-infested areas. Following such catastrophes, DNA profiling of the available body parts is the only fool-proof scientific method of establishing identity. This conclave is an unique feature in the calendar...

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NBI tags four more unidentified bodies of Typhoon Sendong victims

OZAMIZ CITY, Misamis Occidental, Feb. 5 (PIA) – At least four (4) additional unidentified dead bodies have been tagged by the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) in Iligan City, last Feb. 1, this year. This brings to 1,292, the total dead bodies of Typhoon Sendong victims, of which only 923 have been identified and accounted for by the Regional Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council (RDRRMC), region 10, as of the period. Regional Director Ana Caňeda of the Office of Civil Defense (OCD), region 10 and Chairperson of the RDRRMC-10, said the total figure already include the dead bodies recovered from the following areas: Cagayan de Oro City (CDO), 657, Iligan City, 490, and Manticao and El Salvador towns of Misamis Oriental, 80, Bukidnon province, 45, Zambaonga area, 9, municipality of Lopez Jaena and Jimenez in Misamis Occidental and from the Misamis Oriental area, 5. The suicide case involving a 33-year old male inside...

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PNG ferry disaster victims ‘likely dead’

Port Moresby - Papua New Guinea authorities scaled back their search on Sunday for survivors from the sinking of a passenger ferry, saying none of the more than 100 people still missing were likely to be found alive. The Pacific nation's National Maritime Safety Authority (NMSA) moved from search to recovery mode after scouring the waters for 56 hours without finding a survivor of Thursday's sinking of the MV Rabaul Queen near the city of Lae. “Whilst rescue operations are likely to continue, weather permitting, for some more time, basically we are looking for bodies from now onwards,” said NMSA rescue coordinator Nurur Rahman. A fifth body was found on Sunday but Rahman said the number of survivors remained the same at 246 and there was little hope, given the thoroughness of the search and amount of debris picked over, of finding any others. “There is a high degree of confidence, that if there were any active survivors or persons inside...

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Raising the dead: The grim quest for bodies on board the capsized Costa Concordia

After the tragedy has come the quiet heroism of the Italian rescue teams. Live was given exclusive access to the divers and sappers who are searching for bodies in a half-submerged hulk they know could...

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