Age, gender of human skeleton found north of Wichita unknown (+video)

The Sedgwick County Sheriff’s Office is investigating the discovery of human skeletal remains found in a wooded area near 61st Street North and Hillside.

The remains were found by a hunter, the sheriff’s office said in a release. The sheriff’s office was notified at around 10 p.m. on Tuesday.

“They are processing the scene,” Lt. Lin Dehning said Wednesday afternoon. “We are at square one of this.

“We don’t know any age, we don’t know a gender,” he said. “We have not yet determined if there’s been a crime.”

Investigators are being meticulous, Dehning said.

“We’re working it as we would if it was a homicide, but we don’t know if it’s a homicide,” he said.

In a news briefing, Capt. Greg Pollock said investigators are combing through an area about one-eighth of a mile long.

“At some point, investigators are down on their hands and knees,” he said. “Some skeleton parts are very large and others are very small, so the search takes a long time.”

The area where the remains were found was once a salvage yard, Pollock said.

Investigators are combing through piles of brick and metal as well as “sticker bushes,” tall brush and other areas of thick foliage.

“(There are) a lot of unanswered questions at this point,” Pollock said.

The Sedgwick County Sheriff’s Office reached out to the county coroner as well as Wichita State anthropologists for assistance in the case, Pollock said. The anthropologists were unable to come to the area where the remains were found because of finals at the school, but the sheriff’s office has been in contact over the phone, Pollock said.

Along with discovering the identity of the human remains, Dehning said, investigators will be looking into what circumstances led to the body being left in the rural, wooded area.

This story was originally published December 2, 2015 at 11:11 AM with the headline "Age, gender of human skeleton found north of Wichita unknown (+video)."