Operation Identify Me

Operation Identify Me was launched on 10 May 2023 by Interpol to solve cold cases across Western Europe to identify 22 unidentified women who were found deceased in the Netherlands, Belgium and Germany between 1976 and 2019.^[1] Most of the women were murdered, and have never been identified.^[2]

A public appeal was made for information surrounding the unidentified women.^[3] Interpol alongside Dutch, German, and Belgian police forces released forensic facial reconstructions as well as other information used in the investigations.^[4] It is believed some of the murdered women may be from parts of Eastern Europe.^[5]

Cases

The murder cases span five decades.^[6] The bodies were discovered between October 1976 and August 2019.^[7] Their average ages range from 15 to 30.^[8] Most of the women suffered violent deaths.^[9]

#	Case code	Case name	Date of discovery	Country	Location	Estimated age	Progress	Details
1	NL01	"Heul Girl"/ "The girl on the parking lot"	24 October 1976	Netherlands	A12 motorway near Maarsbergen	13 to 20	Unidentified	Hikers were near the former parking De Heul on the A12, in Maarsbergen, Netherlands, between Utrecht and Arnhem. Hidden under soil and branches, they found the body of a woman.[10] It had been linked to a missing person case in the same area but in 2006 it was found to have been incorrect.[11]
2	DE02	"The woman by the motorway"	16 March 1986	Germany	Near Heidelberg	27 to 33	Unidentified	A woman was found near the Weißer Stock parking area where the A6 motorway meets the A5.[12]
3	DE05	"The woman in men’s clothing"	8 November 1988	Germany	Spandauer Vorstadt	25 to 30	Unidentified	A group of seven forest workers found the body of a woman lying in a hole in the middle of a fenced and protected area. It is believed that the hole had been opened by foxes.[13]
4	NL02	"Teteringen Girl"	25 December 1990	Netherlands	Teteringen, Breda	15 to 25	Unidentified	The body of an olive skinned woman was found in the woods in Teteringen, near Breda on Christmas Day 1990.[14][15]
5	BEL01	"The woman in the well"	6 August 1991	Belgium	Attenhovendreef, Holsbeek	30 to 55	Unidentified	The body of a woman was found in a rainwater well in the grounds of a cottage. Her body might have been in the well for up to two years.[16]
6	BEL02	"The woman with the flower tattoo"	3 June 1992	Belgium	Antwerp	31[17]	Identified	The body of a woman was found lying against a grate in the river ‘Groot Schijn' in Antwerp.[18] She had a tattoo of a black flower on her left arm.[19] In November 2023 she was identified as Rita Roberts from the United Kingdom.[17]
7	NL03	"The woman in the canal"	7 September 1992	Netherlands	Amsterdam	25 to 45	Unidentified	On 6 September 1992, in the centre of Amsterdam, a passer-by found two hands at Lauriergracht; when the canal was searched, two lower legs were found. Subsequently, a suitcase containing the torso of a female was found in the canal at Egelantiersgracht. Some days later, more body parts were found at Prinsengracht.[20]
8	NL04	"Woman at the border"	6 July 1994	Netherlands	Retranchement, near the border with Belgium.	35 to 47	Unidentified	Body parts were found in a thicket at the edge of the parking lot of visitors’ centre.[21]
9	NL05	"The woman with the bracelet"	13 January 1995	Netherlands	Uilenstede, Amstelveen	20 to 35	Unidentified	A passer-by saw a plastic package floating in the water and called the police. The package turned out to contain part of the body of a woman, wrapped in a sheet. Her head, lower legs and one arm were not found.[22]
10	BEL03	"The woman in the dam"	9 May 1996	Belgium	Froidchapelle	25 to 35	Unidentified	The body of a woman was found in the lake near the La Plate Taille dam in Froidchapelle. The body may have been in the water for up to 1 or 2 years.[23]
11	DE03	"The burned body in the forest"	2 June 1997	Germany	Altena	18 to 22	Unidentified	A nude female body was found in a wooded area in Altena-Bergfeld, North Rhine-Westphalia. The victim had been raped, strangled and then set on fire.[24] Post-mortem exams showed that it is almost 100% certain that the crime was committed by a member of the victim's family.[25]
12	DE06	"The woman with the flower skirt"	24 July 1997	Germany	Todtnau	Around 20	Unidentified	The partially burnt body of a woman was found in a pit near Weissenbach forest car park.[26]
13	NL06	"The woman on the boat"	16 January 1998	Netherlands	Amsterdam	25 to 35	Unidentified	The body of a woman was found on a burnt out houseboat.[27]
14	NL07	"The woman in the Gaasp river"	17 September 1999	Netherlands	Driemond	18 to 35	Unidentified	The body of a woman who was killed by gunshot was found in an industrial waste container floating in the Gaasp river and encased in concrete.[28]
15	DE01	"The body in the bog"	14 October 2001	Germany	Worringen, Cologne	20 to 30	Unidentified	A mushroom picker found the dead body of a woman, thought to have been mixed race, in the Worringer Bruch bog area in the Worringen quarter of Cologne.[29] The body had been there for at least four months, and four years at the latest.[30]
16	BEL04	"The woman in the Scheldt"	20 April 2002	Belgium	Antwerp	20 to 40	Unidentified	A body was found in the River Scheldt in the Linkeroever area of Antwerp.[31]
17	DE04	"The body in the carpet"	30 July 2002	Germany	Port at the Weser in Bremen	22 to 35	Unidentified	A bundle containing the body of a woman was found in the River Weser by a boat skipper.[32]
18	NL08	"The woman in the IJ river"	17 May 2004	Netherlands	Amsterdam	16 to 35	Unidentified	The body was found in a suitcase in the IJ River.[33]
19	NL09	"The woman in the suitcase"	12 October 2005	Netherlands	Thorbeckesingel, Schiedam	16 to 22	Unidentified	The body was found in a suitcase in a canal at Thorbeckesingel.[33] The suitcase had been there for some time.[34]
20	BEL05	"The woman in the Meuse"	7 June 2005	Belgium	Jambes	25 to 40	Unidentified	A body was found in the River Meuse.[35]
21	BEL06	"The woman with the artificial nails"	31 May 2009	Belgium	Visé, near the Dutch border	14 to 24	Unidentified	The body of a young woman was found in the Albert Canal in Visé. It had been weighed down by weights.[36]
22	BEL07	"The woman in the park"	29 August 2019	Belgium	Liège	35 to 45	Unidentified	The partially charred skeleton of a woman was found in vegetation near a pathway in Parc de Cointe on Boulevard Gustave Kleyer [fr].[37]

Further inquiries

On 16 May 2023, it was reported that police had received over 200 tip-offs regarding the cases,^[38] with 122 tips from Germany, 55 from Belgium and 51 from the Netherlands, some of them with names.^[39] Near the end of August, the number of tips had increased to over 500.^[40] By November police said they had received about 1,250 tips.^[41]

On August 29, 2023, Interpol made a public appeal on the identification of an unidentified dead boy in Großmehring, Bavaria, Germany. While the unknown dead child was not officially added in Operation Identify Me, he was part of an effort to publicly request tips for unidentified decedents.^[42]

In November 2023, "the woman with the flower tattoo" was named as British woman Rita Roberts.^[43] Roberts was 31 years old when she moved from Cardiff to Antwerp in February 1992 but was reported missing months later.^[44] Due to the publicization of the case, a member of her family in Britain recognised the tattoo and contacted the Belgian authorities to formally identify the body.^[45]

See also

• Body identification
• John Doe
• DNA Doe Project
• Disaster Victim Identification
• The Gentleman of Heligoland is a case looked at amongst many by Locate International.
• Operation Captura, another multi-country appeal for citizen crime assistance.
• The Vanished (podcast)
• Vidocq Society

References

External links

• Operation Identify Me