Detectives Alert for Rings, Tattos

By Sean Gardiner | STAFF WRITER

September 16, 2001

A finger with a wedding band on it. An arm bearing a tattoo.

These are the things that Daniel McKenna and other detectives in the Police Department's Crime Scene Unit know will help a grieving family put aside dreadful uncertainty to mourn its dead.

Over the past week, McKenna and others in the unit have been photographing and cataloging bodies and body parts pulled from the rubble of the World Trade Center, working both at the site of devastation and at the city medical examiner's office.

"Wedding bands could have a date on them or initials. Tattoos are also very helpful in identifying people," said McKenna. "We're doing all we can to give those families back something so they can have a funeral and maybe start the healing process."

Over the past four years collecting evidence with the unit, McKenna has dealt with hundreds of bodies. He's had cases involving amputations, burn victims and those who have suffered severe blunt-trauma injuries. He has brought that experience to bear in cataloging the human remains culled these past few days from tons and tons of debris and rubble.

Sometimes, McKenna and others in the unit deal with pieces of skin. Other times, they may catalog a finger, a lung or an ear. The body parts are photographed, vouchered and sent to the morgue in the hope that DNA testing will yield an identity.

From what he has seen of the horrific tragedy, McKenna said he believes that many, many families won't have a loved one's body to bury, or maybe not even part of a body.

"I hope I'm wrong, completely wrong, and I hope they find everybody," said the 17-year NYPD veteran. "But given what I've seen, it's not very likely."

Every hour of every long, 12-hour shift, McKenna knows that he may be handling the remains of someone he knows. The latest figures showed 23 city police officers and 300 firefighters still missing. The mother of a girl who McKenna's daughter goes to school with hasn't been heard from.

"Absolutely, that's on your mind. But you go on; you have to," the weary detective said. "I'm working for those people out there. If that was one of my family, I'd want someone to do everything they could. And I think that's what we're doing. I really do."