After nine years, the Amsterdam police have discovered the identity of a man whose hull was fished out of the water. It concerns a rich dealer in art and antiques from Russia, concludes the cold case team that the case picked up again this year. The next of kin of the missing man could not be informed because of the war in Ukraine. For that reason, the police are not releasing the name of the victim for the time being.
According to the police, the breakthrough came about thanks to the family. He recently reported the victim as missing and handed in DNA material that was added to an international database. That led to a match with the DNA profile of the found hull. A spokesperson said it was not possible to contact the relevant police unit in Russia. The art dealer probably died as a result of a crime. The police is offering 15,000 euros tip money and distributed at the beginning of this year some details of the gruesome find in hopes that the public will know more about it.
For example, the hull floated in the Amsterdam IJ for a while, wrapped in blue plastic. A passerby didn’t believe it and called the police. Head and limbs were never found. The package was tied together by a rope with an eye splice and hoist. Such knots require some nautical knowledge and skill.
More than 150 bodies of water are found in the Netherlands every year, the national police reports. It is more common for criminals to remove heads and hands to make it more difficult to identify a body. In 2019, for example, the Amsterdam police also fished a hull from the IJ, this time from a woman packed in a trolley. According to DNA expert Charissa van Kooten of the Netherlands Forensic Institute (NFI), a DNA profile is almost always available. ‘We prefer muscle tissue, but bones and molars also work.’ The NFI annually carries out more than a hundred DNA tests on mortal remains. The profile obtained is compared with, for example, the DNA from the toothbrush of a presumed deceased or of his family members. If a suspected identity is missing, the profile is compared with the DNA in the Dutch database of missing persons. In the event of a possible crime, the DNA database for criminal cases is also consulted. Finally, there is an international database for missing persons from Interpol.
If that does not result in a match, says Van Kooten, additional DNA testing can provide answers about hair, eye and skin color, and the probable region of origin of the ancestors. For example, the police previously reported that the torso found must belong to a man with an Eastern European background. In the future, additional DNA testing may provide information about age, height, baldness and whether or not to smoke. Van Kooten: ‘However, this technology is still in the research phase.’