Applying advanced technologies to develop new investigative methods
Ever since EAAF first employed DNA analysis in 1991, the team has continued to apply technologies from neighboring fields to push the boundaries of forensic investigations and unearth new information in human rights cases.
Today, when searching for missing persons, EAAF uses:
- Satellite imagery to learn what an investigative site looked like years prior,
- Drone ortho-photography to gain a high-definition view of a large area of interest,
- LiDAR to pinpoint disturbances in the ground where bodies may have been buried,
- Ground-penetrating radar to peer beneath the soil.
All of these techniques help investigators decide where to dig first and make possible systematic searches in giant fields, military compounds, and desert terrain.
Once discovered, EAAF:
- Applies advanced genetics to identify even the most decayed and fragmented human remains,
- Creates 3D reconstructions of crime scenes to turn a mountain of evidence into an understandable story for judges, investigators, and the public, and
- Stitching together cellphone videos of chaotic urban protests to see who exactly fired the shots that killed civilians and put others in danger.
Advanced technologies elevating forensic practice
- 1
Deep analysis of cellphone videos showed the violence in Nicaragua came almost exclusively from government actors
When protests raged across Nicaragua in 2018, government crackdowns left dozens dead and many more wounded. EAAF organized witness videos of protests across the country into a digital platform to analyze the violence and identified the causes. Investigators applied sound ballistics to the audio from cellphone videos and architectural analysis to clarify exactly who was where and when. The conclusion was a coherent story that the government did not want to hear: police and plain-clothed para-police forces were responsible for almost all the violence, and gunshots previously pinned on protesters really originated from where police were stationed all by themselves a good distance from protesters.
- 2
Satellite imagery disproves the Mexican government’s story of Ayotzinapa
When EAAF intervened in the case of 43 students who went missing in 2014 in Ayotzinapa, Guerrero, the Mexican government claimed the students’ remains were burned in the incinerator of a nearby garbage dump. But the evidence looked suspicious. Its chain of custody was incomplete; it could have been planted.
EAAF studied satellite images of the garbage dump at the time of the crime and found that a fire large enough to burn all those bodies did not occur that day. The revelation effectively disproved the Mexican government’s version of events. It kept the case opened and led to greater resources for the investigation under a new administration’s presidential commission. In 2020 and 2021, EAAF identified the remains of two key victims in a different location. This evidence told a very different story and led to the arrests of perpetrators and public officials involved in the government’s first investigation.
- 3
LiDAR is revolutionizing the searches for hidden graves
Under Argentina’s last dictatorship, military compounds were used as clandestine detention centers for victims of disappearance. Survivors of these torture camps testified that they remember hidden graves on the properties. Judging from their stories of detention, it’s likely that some detainees did not make it.
But the compounds are more than 5,000 hectares in size, and digging through it all with a pick and a shovel could take decades.
Using LiDAR detection, planes fly over these enormous grounds to identify past disturbances in the ground soil where graves may have been dug. With these mapped across the camps, EAAF can then apply traditional archeology to identify hidden graves from decades ago.
The investigation remains a long process, but one dramatically sped up. And as EAAF refines this novel use of LiDAR, the projects in Argentina become laboratories for experimentation that may transform human rights investigations worldwide.