PORT ANGELES — Remains found in a back yard in which a children’s play area was being dug last week are human, forensics experts told the Clallam County Sheriff’s Department.
Although the remains were found at the same area on Bean Road in which sheriff’s personnel dug last year in search of a man who went missing in 1987, officials on Wednesday weren’t ready to say they’re of the same man.
“Positive identification has not been made, and due to the extent of decomposition this will likely have to be done through the scientific process of DNA analysis,” Detective Sgt. Lyman Moores II said in a statement issued Wednesday.
Undersheriff Ron Peregrine said there are many possibilities.
“At an older home as this one is, it was not uncommon to bury a loved one in the back yard — and it wasn’t a formal thing with a casket or anything,” he said.
“This one is very decomposed, so until we can determine a cause of death and positive ID, we are not going to make any assumptions.”
