However, we are all aware of the restraints imposed by the real world and, given the ever-increasing numbers of people who go missing, there will be those who are never found, dead or alive. Virtually every UK police force holds human remains which, despite their best efforts, remain unidentified (‘unidents’). Every year some of these will be buried without their given names, unbeknownst to their families and friends, because the investigative authorities have been unable to establish who they were in life.
