Police using 3-D facial reconstruction to help identify body found in 2010

Hong Kong detectives are using a three-dimensional facial reconstruction for the first time to help them identify a body found in 2010.

Police hope the technique, often seen on television forensic crime dramas, will help them name an unidentified man whose badly decomposed body was found in Sai Kung two years ago.

The chained and decomposed body of the man was found in a stream bed by a hiker on a remote hillside on May 16, 2010. Three-quarters of the body had been reduced to skeletal remains.

Some evidence on the body suggested the victim was an illegal mainland immigrant. The Kowloon East regional crime unit sought help from mainland authorities in an attempt to establish his identity. Now, after several months' work and at a cost of HK$50,000, they can show them a face.

"After studying the skull and teeth, a Hong Kong dental specialist made a clay model of the victim's face and head," Superintendent Kevin Sin Chi-sing of Kowloon East regional crime unit said. "It was then sent to Australia, where the colouring was done."

The model was scanned into a computer, where it was coloured digitally and a photographic image was produced.