HORSEHEADS, N.Y. (WENY) -- New York State Police are investigating after two kayakers discovered human remains in a wooded area near the Chemung River on September 28. Authorities confirmed to WENY News that the remains have been sent for a forensic autopsy.

"Right now we treat anytime we have skeletal remains or anything that we find of that nature," says Trooper Lynnea Crane. "We treat it as a criminal investigation until we can rule that out. So I can't update you with any further information on it once we have more in the investigation we have quite a bit of legwork to do."

Crane told WENY News that the remains will go through a process during an examination, but that could take some time. Anthropologists will work to identify remains through methods such as analyzing fingerprints, DNA, and dental records, or comparing them to missing person databases. 

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"If, in this case, down on the river, we would use our underwater recovery team, we would utilize our drone team. We also get organized searches. We do forensic mapping. There's a lot to it," says Crane.
 

Crane explained, "It's a death investigation and we're going to investigate it to our fullest, so we have to treat it just like it's a homicide until we can prove otherwise. So there's a lot of moving parts, there's a lot of information that we need to take in and a lot of things that we need to process before we can actually reveal anything to the public."

This isn't the first time skeletal remains have been found along the Chemung River. In May 2022, a boater discovered a human jawbone east of Chemung. DNA testing later identified the remains as those of 22-year-old Matthew Barber, who went missing in November 2020. 

Additionally, in May 2020, adult skeletal remains were found between Elmira and Lowman. They were later identified as James Burdick of Corning, who had been missing since November 2018.

The investigation into the latest discovery is ongoing.