Mystery of the skeleton kept under wraps at the Australian Museum for 30 years

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A skeleton that sat in a box at the Australian Museum for more than three decades after it was mistaken for Indigenous remains is finally getting its day in court – but police are appealing

to the public for more information first.

A coronial inquest opened briefly on Thursday before adjourning so that investigators can gather more evidence in a bid to identify the bones – now confirmed to be an adult male of European

descent who died up to 16 years prior to being found.

An inquest will try to identify skeletal remains found in Sydney's outer north-west in 1976 and held at the Australian Museum until 2013.

The NSW Coroner's Court heard a group of men from a nearby Aboriginal rehabilitation centre found the bones along the McDonald River near Wrights Creek Road, St Albans, in Sydney's

outer-north west, in 1976.

A police forensic pathologist at the time thought the bones were Aboriginal, so they were handed to the Australian Museum under the National Parks and Wildlife Act, which designated the

museum as a repository for Aboriginal remains at the time.

"As part of the Museum’s ongoing repatriation program, a community report was commissioned at a later date with the purpose of returning this ancestor to country," said Phil Gordon, who

overseas the museum's repatriation program, in a statement.

A recent forensic examination confirmed the skeleton is a European male.

It wasn't until June 2009 that the museum conducted its own analysis, and determined the skeleton's ancestry was "predominantly European", advocate assisting Brooke Notley told the inquest

on Thursday.

It was then returned to Glebe mortuary in 2013 and a fresh investigation was launched.

But, by that time, police had few leads. The men who found the bones in 1976 had died.

Investigators looked into three possible missing persons in the area, with no matches. DNA sampling led them nowhere.

In 2019, the skeleton went to Waikato University in New Zealand, where radio carbon testing was carried out and interpreted by a forensic anthropologist.

Evidence from that study revealed the man was 25-45 years old when he died – and his death was estimated to have occurred between 1960 and 1976.

He would have been 169-182 centimetres tall, and was wearing a woollen garment believed to be a cardigan, and men's shorts.

Sergeant Notley requested that the inquest be adjourned for a few months so police can try to find other potential witnesses and leads. Outside court, she called for anyone who may have

information that could help to identify the mystery bones to come forward.

Police said there is no evidence to suggest foul play in the man's death.

A new date for the inquest will be set in 2021.

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SaveLog in, register or subscribe to save articles for later.License this articleCourtsInquestCourtsPoliceJenny Noyes is a journalist at the Sydney Morning Herald.Connect via Twitter,

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