This photograph of U.S. Army Sgt. Roger Duquesne was used to identify his remains by superimposing a recovered skull using a newly developed photo-video method developed at an Australian university. The bottom left portion indicates a unique teeth configuration that aided in the identification. (Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency)
Two years ago, forensic scientists at the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency were at a dead end in their efforts to identify the remains of a U.S. service member who died and went missing in the Korean War.
They suspected the remains were those of Army Sgt. Roger Duquesne, who served with the 89th Medium Tank Battalion, 25th Infantry Division during that conflict.
But repeated attempts since 2011 to positively confirm his identity using familiar methods such as dental records, chest X-rays and DNA had failed, DPAA said in a February news release in which it first described the method by which he was finally identified.
In early 2024, Carl Stephan, a forensic anthropologist at the University of Queensland, Australia, gave a presentation at DPAA’s Hawaii lab about a breakthrough technique for cranio-facial superimposition that combines still photos and video.
Simply put, cranio-facial superimposition overlays an image of a missing person’s skull onto a photograph taken of that person while living to determine if the bone structures match.
With Stephan’s help, DPAA identified Duquesne later that year using the technique.
The cranio-facial superimposition process used to identify the remains of Sgt. Roger Duquesne shows the recovered skull aligns seamlessly with a historical photo taken of the U.S. soldier before he died and went missing in combat Sept. 3, 1950, during the Korean War. (Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency)
Superimposing images in this way is not new, but Stephan, along with Sean Healy, one of his doctoral students, came up with refinements to overcome scientific shortcomings in the technique, Stephan said in an April 13 email responding to written questions.
DNA testing was not a useful tool on the Duquesne remains because no family reference samples were available. The soldier’s dental records revealed no useful distinguishing features, and chest X-rays that could potentially reveal bone anomalies were unavailable.
Stephan’s approach integrated, for the first time, two previously independent methods of superimposition, one using still photos, the other using video, he said.
He described the fusion as “the best of both worlds,” with video providing fast, user-friendly skull-face alignment, while the still frame photo provides high resolution needed for anatomical examinations.
Yet even with that innovation, two primary challenges must be overcome to use superimposition, he said.
First, a photograph of sufficient resolution of the subject while he was living must be available.
Second, the photo must include a reference object suitable to determine the “focus distance” between the camera and subject.
Accurate focus distance is needed because the perspective of a subject narrows or widens depending upon how close or far away the camera operates, Stephan said.
In Duquesne’s case, he appeared in a photograph wearing his Army dress cover, which served as the reference object because of its regulation size.
Stephan obtained a duplicate of the hat and then serially photographed it at differing distances using a camera dolly. At the correct distance, the cover in the new photo could be seamlessly superimposed on the historical photograph.
The skull was then photographed and video recorded at that same distance.
When compared, the superimposed skull fit entirely within the outline of the face in the historical photo, with clear alignment of eye sockets and nasal bridge.
Stephan said it was highly fortunate that Duquesne had posed in the photo with an open-mouth smile that exposed his front teeth.
A prominent right canine tooth in the skull — and the way it cast a shadow on other teeth — precisely matched the photo, he said.
Duquesne is thus far the only identification made using the newly unified video-photo superimposition methods, but it “opens the door” for other difficult cases, Stephan said.
“[T]he conditions necessary to support a worthwhile superimposition effort are rare, but every now and then a useable facial photograph emerges, just like for Duquesne, and the superimposition method can then make critical contributions,” he said.
