Between 2005 and 2011, EAAF worked closely with the Victorian Institute of Forensic Medicine (VIFM) on forensic investigations in Timor-Leste and the Solomon Islands (see the sections on those countries).
Collaboration on the identification of Ned Kelly
Ned Kelly was a famous outlaw in Australia. He was captured in 1880 following a confrontation with the police and was hanged at the old Melbourne prison, where he was buried. Half a century later, in 1929, the prison was relocated, and the remains of the convicts were exhumed and reburied at the new Pentridge Prison in the same city. However, doubts arose regarding the identity of the remains after the transfer. In 2009, VIFM scientists conducted archaeological and anthropological analyses of the exhumed skeletal remains and requested that EAAF complete the study using DNA analysis.
EAAF’s laboratory analyzed the DNA of 60 bone samples from prisoners, dating back more than 130 years, and compared them with the DNA of a contemporary relative of Kelly’s who descended through the maternal line. In 2011, EAAF identified the remains of Ned Kelly.
https://theconversation.com/ned-kelly-remains-are-positively-identified-but-how-was-it-done-3174
