Third right foot discovered in Gulf Islands
Latest foot found on Valdes Island; police not sure if foul play is involved
Rob Shaw, Times Colonist
Published: Thursday, February 14, 2008
VICTORIA - Three severed feet have washed ashore on B.C.'s Gulf Islands in the past six months - all right feet, all in sneakers - in an increasingly bizarre mystery for police.
The latest foot was found last Friday on Valdes Island.
RCMP say they're not sure if foul play is involved and are trying to match any missing person cases to the severed extremity.
Two other right feet, both in size 12 men's sneakers, washed ashore on nearby Gabriola and Jedidiah islands last August. RCMP collected DNA from the grisly remains but could not match them to anyone in police databases.
"It is unusual," said RCMP spokeswoman Const. Annie Linteau. "We are in the preliminary stages of this particular investigation, and of course we will not enter into speculation."
The Vancouver Island Major Crime Unit has sent detectives to investigate the cases, she said.
The latest foot has been turned over to the B.C. Coroners Service for forensic testing.
"We'll be using pathology examinations and anthropology examinations to garner as much information as we possibly can about the remains," said Jeff Dolen, B.C.'s assistant deputy chief coroner.
Although it is somewhat common to find individual body parts, Dolen said this would be "the first instance of three such similar remains being discovered" in such proximity.
A body in the ocean will first sink, and then, depending on the depth, float back to the surface as it becomes bloated with gas.
It is common for hands, feet and the head to detach as a body decomposes, said Gail Anderson, a forensic entomologist from Simon Fraser University who has submerged pigs in Vancouver Island's Saanich Inlet to study ocean decomposition. But generally, those limbs do not float, she said.
"Obviously there's some sort of current picking up light items and washing them to those particular areas," said Anderson.
Her research on pig carcasses has shown crabs, seals, sharks and fish are frequent scavengers of body parts.
Feet in particular can go through a process called adipocere, as the ocean turns the fat into a soaplike substance during weeks and months at sea, said Anderson.
She said this makes it extremely difficult for forensic analysts to gather clues from the body part, such as its age.
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