Sherlock Bones Report

STEM 2 period 2
Catalina Hernandez, Daniela Prieto, Ruth Gil, Arleny Lujan

One dark autumn midnight, a lady was walking down a pitch-dark alleyway, as she
walked by the familiar path she noticed two possums ripping through some black garbage bags.
She wasnt startled by the possums since it was such a common sight. Then she saw a dim
sparkle that caught her attention, as she got closer she was able to distinguish something white
looking. As her curiosity spiked, she approached the creatures, thinking she would find old
jewelry. The possums finally ripped open the bag when a hand flung out. This left the lady in
shock and a cold shiver ran down her spine. She immediately called the police when she
realized what she had seen.
The first thing our team did when we received the bones was that we gathered the
materials we would need to investigate. We got the large and small calipers, and a compass.
We first got the pelvis and carefully examined it in order to determine sex and age. We also had
to find the sub pubic angle, pubis body width, greater sciatic notch by using the compass and
small calipers and then we determined the shape of the pelvis to determine the victims sex.
Afterwards we looked at the different features the pelvis had such as whether or not some
bones were fused to determine the victims age. Then our team examined the skulls features
which also helped to determine sex and race although the data on race may be inaccurate. We
also examined the femur and the humerus. We had to once again use the small calipers to
measure the vertical diameter of the femur and the bicondylar width. We then used the large

calipers to find the length of the femur. The same was done to the humerus except for two
things. We used the small calipers to measure the transverse diameter and the epicondylar
width. After all of the data was put into the table my team then began the difficult task of
determining race, age, height, and sex.
After all the examination we discovered that the victim is a female, is around 20-25 age
old and is bi-racial. The reason why she is female is that the sub-pubic angle is 100 degrees
and if the angle is greater than 90 degrees it's a female and the pelvic and cavity shape is
circular and wide which is good for woman to give birth. Also the mandible shape is more
V-shaped than U-shaped and the frontal bone is round, globular than low and slanting. She is
around 20-25 and the ilium, ischium, and pubis bone are fully ossified with no trace of
cartilaginous. The victim is also black because shape of the orbital opening is rounded and
somewhat square which is for white and the nasal silling/ guttering which she has no trace so
she could be bi-racial. In order to identify bones you need to have more knowledge towards
how to analyze bones. We found out that the Sub-Pubic Angle is greater than 90 degrees
which means its a female. For the skull features, the shape of the eye orbit is round shape and
that the Mandible shape is a V-shape. The Femur measurements are corresponding to female
measurements because they have lower measurements than males due that males have
greater numbers. The femur measurements also helped us to determine the victims height, by
putting the maximum femur height into an equation, the victim may have been 4 feet 7 inches to
4 feet 9 inches. So to recap the victim is a female, aged 20-25, may be black, and is 4 feet 7
inches to 4 feet 9 inches.

During this investigation our group discovered that the victim is a most likely a black
female aged 20-25 and about 4 feet 7 inches to 4 feet 9 inches. My recommendations for steps
for the future of this investigation is to send anything that may contain DNA evidence to a lab to
find the identity of this person.