FORSYTH, Ga. (WPGA) - The Georgia Bureau of Investigation unveiled a new mausoleum to give hundreds of unidentified people a proper resting place.

The state has hundreds of bodies in its custody that are either unclaimed or unidentified. The GBI says the mausoleum symbolizes their commitment to finding where they belong. The mausoleum is on the campus of the Georgia Public Safety Training Center in Forsyth, Georgia. Director Chris Hosey says the work to find their families, however, is far from over.

“A resting ground for those whose names we may never know but who’s lives dignity and humanity we honor just the same”, Hosey continues to say “They’re unidentified but they are somebody’s relative son daughter, whatever the case may be and we are going to work diligently at GBI with our crime lab with our M.E’s (Medical Examiners) Office, with our cold case units and making every attempt to identify the remains we have here”.

The new resting place was made possible by a law allowing the medical examiner to order the disinterment of remains without having to get a court order. Ashley Garrish, the Director of Medical Operations, spoke about how that has led to success in investigations.

“We can come back and forth as needed. So with the recent cases, once I received a new lead in a case. I came down here and was able to disinter that case so we could work those new leads. It is a very simple process now,” said Garrish.

State Sen. Rick Williams adds that the legislation aids in getting remains to families faster.

“Some people had actually mentioned barring them, buying cemetery property, and burying them. But that would require disinterring a lot of remains and a lot of work to open a vault, too, to return to the family if they were identified,” said Sen. Williams.

The oldest set of remains inside dates back to 1969. Since then, DNA tech used for investigations has improved.

“They can run what’s called a snip…just a small portion of DNA. Then run it against things like 23 and me, different DNA repositories of families, and locate which family that individual may belong to,” said Garrish.

Garrish went on to say that they actually had two cases identified through the new DNA technology. She also added that the mausoleum project was initiated sometime around 2018 it can hold up to 324 people at once

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