FBI called to help ID remains in Campbell

The identity of skeletal remains found more than a year ago in a ditch in Evington is still a mystery.

The remains were so decomposed that Campbell County deputies have long exhausted the local and state resources available for identifying the person, Major Steve Hutcherson said.

Now deputies are hoping the Federal Bureau of Investigation can help.

“The state lab has told us there wasn’t enough DNA to do a comparison,” Hutcherson said.

The skeletal remains were found in a drainage ditch near the railroad tracks in Evington on March 16, 2007. Several Norfolk Southern employees riding on a train saw the remains almost completely submerged in water in a ditch about 25 yards from tracks that run parallel to Lawyers Road.

The remains had been in the ditch for more than six months.

The body was found wearing a pair of black jeans, a short-sleeved blue, a white plaid shirt, and a pair of size 12 white Franklin tennis shoes with a blue stripe.

The remains appear to be of an elderly white man, Hutcherson said.

“We think we know who it is,” he said.

Hutcherson said if their hunch is correct, the man is believed to have had medical problems. No foul play is suspected in the death.

The remains were initially sent to the medical examiners’ office in Roanoke, but the condition was so poor that identification could not be made. No dental records were located to help in the process.

Anyone with information about the remains is asked to contact the Campbell County Sheriff’s Office at (434) 332-9580.