Abstract
Law enforcement, medical examiners, and coroners call upon forensic anthropologists to assist with the skeletal analysis of human remains irrespective of the skeletal completeness, trauma presence, or elemental quantity (Garvin et al., 2021). These forensic anthropology cases require meticulous and detailed documentation of the skeletal remains present for analysis in comportment with the Daubert Standard (Christensen et al., 2019); Title XXX: Social Welfare. Fla. Stat. § 409.25575, 2022). Existing databases used as case and crime record repositories (e.g., Uniform Crime Report (UCR), National Missing and Unidentified Persons System (NamUS), Florida Unidentified Decedents Database (Fluid-DB), National Crime Information Center (NCIC), etc.) include forensic anthropological reports to supplement data from other medicolegal data sets such as the cause (disease, injury, or condition) and manner (natural, accidental, suicide, homicide, or undetermined) of death; dental records; presumed identification; circumstances surrounding death (Craig, 2016). Previous studies revealed digital repositories help solve cold (unsolved) cases by providing a common, secure medium for interdisciplinary use for the revision and inclusion of personal identifiers accessible by the public, assisting with the resolution for thousands of missing persons and unidentified persons cases annually (Standard Investigation Procedures. Florida Rule § 11G-2, 2012; NamUs). Nevertheless, a lack of research examining case data attribute tags (e.g. biological estimates for sex, age, stature, trauma analysis timing, sequence, and method, etc.) in forensic anthropological casework (from initial consultation request through adjudication) exists. As of the 2018 Census, approximately 11,300 total human remains cases are stored within medical examiner and coroner offices awaiting updated analysis (Brooks, 2021). The purpose of this research is to bridge the gap, in literature and practice, by examining the effectiveness of digital data repository for data analytics that produces data on the impact of skeletal incompleteness on the forensic anthropologist’s interpretation of trauma to supplement medicolegal death investigations
