January 10, 2024 • 49 mins
In this episode of Zone 7, Crime Scene Investigator, Sheryl McCollum, talks with forensic artist, Joe Mullins. Joe discusses how he uses his artistic talents to help law enforcement solve cold cases. He shares stories of bringing names and answers to families, challenges interpreting ancestry from skulls, memorable lessons from John Walsh, and the rewards of teaching forensic art.
Guest Bio and Links:
Joe Mullins is a forensic artist with 25 years of experience, particularly, in facial reconstruction for cold cases. Mullins has studied at the Savannah College of Art and Design and attended the FBI Academy. He works with the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. Listeners can learn more about his work at www.missingkids.org.
Resources:
The Art of Forensics at the New York Academy of Art
National Center for Missing and Exploited Children
Show Notes:
- [0:00] Welcome back to Zone 7 with Crime Scene Investigator, Sheryl McCollum.
- [2:00] Sheryl introduces guest, Joe Mullins to the listeners
- [4:10] Question: Where and how do you have these skulls?
- [9:15] The Art of Forensics at the New York Academy of Art
- [12:10] The process of facial reconstruction
- [15:10] Question: When do you start to see the face, meaning, when do you see the person looking back at you?
- [17:30] Question: Why are lips so challenging for a sculptor?
- [26:00] Question: Can you talk about some cases solved because of your efforts?
- [35:30] "People say closure. I don’t, I don’t like that word. I’m never, never going to forget my son. A better way to explain the service that the National Center is providing with these images is you’re providing answers to families because not knowing is a nightmare you can’t wake up from." - John Walsh to Joe Mullins
- [45:30] Training and mentoring the next generation
- [46:45] Take a moment to look at the current list of missing children at www.missingkids.org
- [48:50] “At first, it was a bit eerie for the students as they unpacked the skull replicas. But about four days into the class, something changed. Students were no longer looking at a skull, a relatively abstract concept of a human, but a person.” -J.V
- Thanks for listening to another episode! If you love the show and want to help grow the show, please head over to Itunes and leave a rating and review!
---
Sheryl “Mac” McCollum is an Emmy Award-winning CSI, a writer for CrimeOnLine, Forensic and Crime Scene Expert for Crime Stories with Nancy Grace, and a CSI for a metro Atlanta Police Department. She is the co-author of the textbook., Cold Case: Pathways to Justice. Sheryl is also the founder and director of the Cold Case Investigative Research Institute, a collaboration between universities and colleges that brings researchers, practitioners, students and the criminal justice community together to advance techniques in solving cold cases and assist families and law enforcement with solvability factors for unsolved homicides, missing persons, and kidnapping cases.
You can connect and learn more about Sheryl’s work by visiting the CCIRI website https://coldcasecrimes.org
Social Links:
- Ema
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:09):
It was about two thousand and five, two thousand and six.
I was shopping for some toys for my children when
I saw this kit and it was a green box
with big letters that said CSI and then it said
Forensic Facial Reconstruction Kit. Now, it was clearly designed as
an educational toy. I would save from twelve to fourteen
(00:33):
and up. But I thought my students at the college
would love this kind of as a side project. And
my thought forgetting this whole thing started with them was
for them to learn what actually goes into these facial reconstructions.
You start with just a skull, and then you've got
(00:55):
to take great time and care to put together this face,
these eyebrows, these ears, these lips. It takes a minute. Now,
I'm going to tell you all the truth. By the
time my students got finished, our person just looked like
this sexy pirate. They had all kinds of names for
him that I will spare y'all, but just know they
(01:15):
were hilarious Captain so and so and whatnot. But what
they did learn, these non artists is the time that
it takes, the understanding that it takes to look at
just a skull and then try to create this missing person.
It was one of the best exercises ever, even though
(01:36):
it was just a toy. Tonight we got the real deal.
We got Joe Mullins. This is part of our Legend series,
and when I say legend, I mean it. One of
the most important thing Joe is doing with his time
and talents. He's teaching the next generation. For twenty five years,
(01:59):
he has created images that have helped id people that
have gone missing, those that have been recovered with no name.
Joe has studied at the Savannah Art of College and Design.
He attended the FBI Academy. He also uses his skills
to predict what famous people's children might look like. In
(02:20):
twenty twelve, he predicted what Cap Middleton and Prince William's
children might look like, which I find extraordinary. He is
part of the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children
and I do not think his talent could be utilized
any better. The power of art in cold cases was
(02:40):
in full force at this year's Crime con Let me
tell y'all something about Booth twenty five. I have never
in my life witnessed just a miracle in action. Joe's talent,
his god given gift, in my opinion, was on full display.
(03:01):
He takes a skull day one, and by the time
that crime con is finished, there is a person, There
is a face, there is somebody so recognizable. If you
know this person, that this case is going to be
solved by that person getting their name back. So ladies
(03:21):
and gentlemen, please help me welcome Joe Mullins.
Speaker 2 (03:25):
Sure, thank you so much. That was one of the
more flattering introductions I think I've ever received in my career.
Thank you. I was smiling ear to ear over here.
Speaker 1 (03:36):
Well, I'm telling you my daughter Caroline and I you
saw us multiple times at crime Con. I couldn't even
speak to you. I didn't even want to interrupt for
one second. Your genius because what I was watching was
just beyond anything I had ever seen. And you are
talented and you can sculp, there's no question about it.
(03:56):
But when you're talking about here's a skulp, and if
you had fifty of them, can you really see a
whole lot of differences? You know what I mean. But
you took it, and here's what I saw. In my mind.
I'm thinking that skull is evidence. How does he have
that skull? So let's talk about that first, Where and
(04:17):
how do you have these skulls?
Speaker 2 (04:19):
There's a lot of that goes on behind the scenes
to pull off, you know, being there at crime Con
it was one of four full time forensic artists at
the National Center for missaink Sported Children. It took the
whole team to pull that off. And what's because ultimately
I can't investigators, medical examiners don't want do you want
(04:43):
me to travel with a human remains an actual skull.
So we've utilized the technology as available today, so we
use a Sometimes you have to exhume the remains and
work with the investigators, the Emmy's office corners, and then
find now that we have this goal and now we
need to get a scan done of it. So we
(05:05):
circle the around with the AME's offices and find a
hospital that's willing to donate their time and energy to
do a CT scan of a skull. And that's always
an interesting phone call talking to some calling cold calling
the radiology department and explaining I'm a forensic artist, Can
I come scan a skull at your CT scanner. Once
we get all those ducks in a row, then it's
(05:28):
just a matter of getting then facilitating a three D
print of the skull and then going through the process
of you know, reconstructing the face you know, back on
there and hopes to get that victim identified. So there's
even that was a you know, a shortened version of
everything that goes into pulling pulling those events off. But
it's it's such an amazing response to especially there at
(05:52):
crime Con that we got. It was. It was humbling.
I my co workers. You We talked to Cal Walsh.
Uh he was joking, it's like, well, you're just like I,
you know, sort of a you know, celebrities, like this
is your You're stealing the spotlight here. It's all all
about you now. It was it was just amazing. That
(06:14):
was I couldn't ask for a better response from the
attendees there at the crime Con because that's not where
they They were only interesting and listening to every hanging
on every word that I was saying as I was
explaining what I was doing and the nuances of the skull.
But they were truly I think everybody that I talked
to came back around on that last day to take
(06:34):
pictures of the finished facial approximation to help, you know,
blast it out on social media to help get get
her identified. It was truly amazing. So it's very very
humbling experience.
Speaker 1 (06:48):
And again Callahan Walsh could not have been more gracious
and genuine and hey, please come back and take a
picture like he was promoting the whole thing as well,
which to me, the team you're talking about is one
of the most important things that you can have in
order for you to be able to do what you
need to do.
Speaker 2 (07:09):
Yeah, everybody there, you know, had Christy, you had two
artists there. Christy was showcasing our age progression technology there
and she was just as swamped as I was with
people interested in seeing what we were doing. And really
everybody else was helping because I couldn't talk to everybody,
so cal would jump in. We had you know, Reggie,
(07:31):
you know what, Christine There's everybody was there was helping
explain what I was doing. So we had that much,
We had that many people that we needed to that
we grab their attention with that type of presentation that
we were doing. It was just I was blown away.
I'm I'm still blown away just you know, talking about
it now and just kind of reliving it. It was
(07:52):
It was truly amazing. I think that's that case. It's
going to get solved because of the attends and the
tension that it got.
Speaker 1 (08:02):
And how in the world do you ever meet or
work with, or just be in the vicinity of Angeline
Hartman and not fall in love with her.
Speaker 2 (08:12):
Won't even know where to begin. See, I'm in a
loss for words. Held just amazing she is, and not
only a friend, she's such such an advocate and supporter
of what we do, you know, working with the media
team there at the National Center, the Forensic Imaging Unit
has it's a very visual unit and it gets a
lot of media attention, as it should, and we wanted
(08:34):
to have to see that in an egotistical way, but
we want Carara doesn't have to be on me. We
want it to be it on these these age progressions
or these facial approximations we're doing. They're interesting stories and
we can use that to our advantage to get them
out to as many eyes as possible, and Angeline is
always seeing the benefit of that, and it's just she
(08:55):
produced a video with one of the classes I did
at the New York Academy of Art back in twenty fifteen,
and I was there it was my class and after
watching her video and she put made me cry.
Speaker 1 (09:09):
She's extraordinary.
Speaker 2 (09:10):
I have Angeline, you know, my fellow artists, everybody at
the National Center at I mean been there twenty five years.
There everybody says it's like family. It's more than family
that those it's the people with the shared compassion of
helping missing and exploited children. It's just just an amazing
(09:31):
experience to be around those people.
Speaker 1 (09:34):
You know. I tell people all the time when they
ask me, how after forty years have you not burnt out?
Your answer is the reason because I'm surrounded by heroes.
Every day. I literally get to watch the best that
there is operate, and I don't know how in the
world you would ever burn out from that. So I
hear you. I mean, I know who you're working with.
(09:56):
Callahan Walsh is one of my favorite people. Angeline Heartman.
I mean, I've known her for years and years and
she has only gotten better. I mean, it's remarkable. And
then of course you, you know, making you a part of
my Zone seven was so easy, you know, not just
and again, not just the skill. It's not like you're
just watching the best that there is. When you talk
(10:18):
about compassion. That's not something you can teach. And I
would imagine that you and your students from New York
to Virginia to Florida. You know, most of these folks
that have a gift in being a sculptor, they probably
never as a child, thought I'm going to be involved
in solving a cold case. But yet here they're offering
(10:41):
their time and talents in a way that was never
on their radar. But because they do care, here they.
Speaker 2 (10:49):
Are teaching is something that I never really thought that
I would get into career wise, but it is. I
think it's the cool I always say, with annoying frequency,
the coolest job in the world being able to teach.
And there's a moll mark and see everybody's their interests.
You know, day one, it's you know, kind of explaining
the class, but as the as the week, depending on
(11:11):
the workshop or class that I'm doing the full semester.
But there's a time where there's a switch that goes
off and everybody it's really the time when the face
starts to develop on the skull that they're working on.
It's not just a skull now, it's a person, and
there's just a mood swing in the whole room where
everybody is silent or getting real close to their the
face that their sculpting there are attacked and they get it.
(11:35):
There's a switch that goes on they have and that
for me, that was like, I feel like I've done
something just like you said, It's it's inspiring to me
to be able to pass that on because I'm the
passion and the compassion and the energy that I you
know give, you know, like, it's just truly amazing to
be able to pass that on. And it's a it's
(11:55):
such a unique field and very few of us out there,
so having the opportunity to pass it on to the
next generation we need artists, don't let the technology hasn't
come that far yet, whether it's an easy button or
AI generated facial approximations might get there one day. Whether
it's not there yet.
Speaker 1 (12:19):
Well, let's talk about how this job can be difficult.
So with the skull, I understand there's like twenty three
separate bones. Oftentimes with crime you're going to have some
blunt borce trauma. You get to have a bullet hole,
you could have a knife wound, all of these unique issues.
How do you go about starting this face with this skull,
(12:42):
where do you personally start?
Speaker 2 (12:44):
That's definitely one of the more horrific aspects of being
a friends of artists. When somebody's asking me what I do.
They're doing mostly intrigued with the the process and the
end results, but what really goes on behind the scenes,
you know, the reality is that we're dealing with you
know this, these children, especially there at the day job
there at the National Center for Missing Exported Children, and
(13:04):
I was holding a skull of a ten year old
with you know, multiple gunshots or blunt force trauma. It
could go on and all kinds of horrible adjectives to
describe to that, but that just, I guess, motivates me
to help give this this person their identity back and
(13:28):
work on that face. As an artist, I'm approaching it
as you know, my fine art, you know, painting, drawing, sculpting.
The foundation helped get me in the door, but it's
really working side by side with the medical examiner and
particularly a forensic anthropologist. Now, the forensic anthropologist is one
who adds the science aspect of it, because there's that
(13:48):
combination of art and science, and that's where the science
comes from. Where they pick up the skull and can
tell you amazing details about you know, the age range,
the ancestry, female, and just all the distinguishing characteristics, everything
that makes you you, It is etched into your skull.
So it's you know, said all this had fifty skulls,
(14:09):
so that'd be fifty different faces. There's so many details
that are involved in reconstructing the face, and it's just
fascinating to me that all that translates into your soft tissue,
because you think about it, your your skull is the
foundation that you are built on. It's it's everything that's
holding up. Everything about you is under underneath there that
(14:33):
skulls holding it up. So you know, to translate that
and put the reconstruct that face back on there is
And sometimes I'm just amazed at how when we see
the when these cases are resolved, when we get to
see photographs of what these people look like in life,
it is just mind boggling how how accurate some of
(14:56):
these faces are. It's just I just love love my job.
I think it's doing doing God's work, I guess for
I think this is what I was meant meant to do.
Speaker 1 (15:06):
Yeah, I don't think there's any doubt about it. And
anybody that got to watch you at crime Con saw it,
felt it, understood it. It was absolutely undeniable what we
were watching. When do you start to really see the face,
Like not just I'm in the process of molding a
cheekbone or I'm going to put some eyebrows, but when
(15:29):
do you know that person is looking back at you.
Speaker 2 (15:31):
The starting point is it's just now, it's just a skull,
and I have, you know, the facts in front of me.
It's a Caucasian female, late teens, early twenties. And then
as I start, you know, basically work from the top down,
scope the muscles first and add the tissue depth markers
to get the landmarks for how much flesh to put
on the skull. And I worked from the top down,
(15:53):
so it's typically by time I get the forehead and
I set the eyes in the orbits and draw the
irises on and I know scp the nose. That's when
it's it's not a skull. And now there's there's a
set of eyes, you know, staring back at me. And
to add to that, and so I know, the question
was like, how do you know when you're done? So
when I have to put that last It's like an
(16:15):
artist or a painter when you put that last brush brushstrokes,
Like when do you put your brush downs? Like how
do you know when you're done? And I said, for me,
I stop when I see somebody staring back at me.
So that's it happens with every single case.
Speaker 1 (16:28):
We get that.
Speaker 2 (16:29):
I get that same same feelings right by the time
I get the eyes and then the nose on and
because that's sorts of fill out the face, and then
it's I think I probably go faster at that point
because then I just want to I just want to
see that completed face.
Speaker 1 (16:46):
Well, I know at Crome Con, I was watching you
for a little bit and you were taking so just
great care and concern right at the cheek, and then
you went down and you probably spent I don't know,
I want to say, ten minutes just on the left
side of the jawline, and you kept just smoothing and
(17:06):
smoothing with this little instrument. I mean, it just looked
like almost a flat rock and you were barely touching it,
but it did change that expression. It was the most
unbelievable thing. And I know Carolina, and I kept saying,
I want to ask him all these questions, but I
just didn't want to bust into your rhythm. And I thought,
(17:28):
I'm just glad to snatch him later because I just
have to know some things. So why don't you tell us?
You know, why are lips so difficult for a sculpture?
Speaker 2 (17:38):
For it was kind of eye opening for me when
I started teaching classes. I teach a graduate class at
George Mason University in the forensic science department. These aren't
they're not necessarily artists. These are a crime see investigators.
But they they take this class and the one, the
(18:00):
one feature that I know that everybody struggled with that's
not really a sculptor or an artist's lips. Lips seemed
to be the most across the board, the most difficult
feature to sculpt. Blew my mind. I was just like,
why it's lips? Like it was like I remember hating ears.
But I I'm a sculptor, artist by by trade, so
I've conquered conquered that pretty quickly. But it's always it's
(18:24):
always the lips, you know, you think about it, it's it.
It's a very simple. I think it looks like a
very simple formed to sculpt. But I think that's why
it's so it's it's so subtle that people either overdo
it and you get like I get a lot of
duck clips, like puckered up clips.
Speaker 1 (18:43):
Just grabbing the play and squeezing it.
Speaker 2 (18:45):
Yeah, so they grab so I used I came up
with an example of I'm trying to I was wondering,
why is it across the board. The first of all,
they're very flat, their flat lips, and they and everybody
pinched pinches their fingers to get like a real sharp
edge around around to I guess to find the outline
(19:07):
of the lips. But if we were if I would
have asked you right now to draw a set of lips,
that's exactly what you would draw, just a line, be
like the just a very simple basic drawing. But that
that is what people think lips look like. And then
if they draw it that way, that's how they're going
to sculpt. It's very flat and has that that puckered
(19:28):
up that's an outline. Fascinating to me that the lips
is always such a struggle. It's all go Usually on
lip day, what it's called lip service day, I go
we have a practice exercise and make them sculpt the
set of lips just outside of the you know, different
(19:48):
separated from the work that they're doing for their their skull,
and I say, if you're gonna do anything horrible or wrong,
do it, do it on this practice set of lips.
Then we go through and do it on the actual
skull and it's all basically the rest of the day
for that day when it we're doing ellipse, all I
do is usually max out around fifteen students. All I
(20:09):
do is sculpt, keep sculpting lips over and over because
I'll gather nobody around and demonstrate on how to do
it on the skull that I'm working on. I was like, Okay,
we're going to go back and try it, and then
from that moment on, I'm just fixing, fixing the lips
the entire class.
Speaker 1 (20:29):
That's amazing. Well, as you know, I have the opportunity
and the gift of working with Kelly Lawson with the
Georgia Bureau of Investigation, and if it's a victim that
I've taken to her that has witnessed something or was
a victim of something that she's going to describe the perpetrator.
Kelly normally asked them, does this person remind you of
(20:52):
anybody famous? Like, is there a base I can start with?
And I find the way that she takes somebody that
you know maybe says yes, they look like X, Y
or Z. Then she starts to start drawing as they're talking,
and of course the eyebrows are imported in the ears
and the nose in the mouth and all that, and
(21:13):
before long, like you say, there is somebody staring back
at her, and the victim can then kind of, you know,
craft and move and change slightly to alter it until
they get to the person. And that's when the victim
or the witness goes, that's him, you know, or that's her.
(21:34):
You don't have that ability. You don't have that gift
of having somebody say, well, this is what they look like.
You're working from literally nothing and then hoping that what
you have come up with looks like a missing person.
Speaker 2 (21:51):
I have to give credits credit. Kelly and her mom,
Marla are two of the most talented artists I've ever seen,
and of composite drawings that they do unbelievable and of
course remarkably successful with those images. But just like the
composite sketches, they do. We always say, as we as
(22:14):
do these, We're never going to come up with a
portrait of what that who that person that victim is
describing to the Kelly and I'm never going to come
up with a exact likeness of what this victim look like,
you know, sculpting working for a skull, But we found
forensic arts. One of my good friends and mentor, Steve Mankouzi,
(22:37):
was retired NYPD composite artist. Still his quote he said,
as a forensic artist, we live in a wonderful world
of almost is good enough where we don't have to
come up with the portraits. But still the main key
to everything we do as friends of art with composite
sketches or facial approximations, it doesn't work unless the right
(22:57):
person sees it. So the works that Kelly does, you know,
the drawings like somebody's that the victim says, that's that's him.
Now they have to take that back and match it
up to you know, like mug shots or you know,
rest photos, or do their due diligence. But that's it's
the same process with these facial approximations. We want I
(23:18):
want to get it out through as many eyes as
possible and help get these victims identified, help get those
those bad guys off the street, all because of forensic art.
So it's that's why, I'm sure sure Kelly probably says
the same thing. She's got the coolest, coolest job in
the world. She gets to help bad guys and help
the answer some questions for families. It's pretty cool.
Speaker 1 (23:42):
It is pretty cool. Is there a case that sticks
with you, like, is there a skull where maybe you've
gotten a face looking back at you, but nobody reported
a child missing that fits that in that area or.
Speaker 2 (23:57):
Back when we would actually receive the skulls and in
the mayo when it would ship into us and we did,
there was that. It's just a horrible the blunt force trauma.
There was the case they would call it the the
barrel case. I was a mom and two of her
daughters and there was a third.
Speaker 1 (24:21):
Child.
Speaker 2 (24:23):
So the mother and her two daughters ended up getting identified.
It was a Terry rass Mussen. That's serial killer. It
is from Vermont. So the the mom and her two
daughters got identified, but there was that third child who
do DNA. They realized that it was the father was
(24:45):
the killer. But they still don't know, they don't know
who she is. And that's that case is just we
have you know, there's four victims, we have three of
the four. I really want to give that poor little
girl her name back. That was one that sticks with me.
(25:06):
I think it was mostly because we actually that's back
when we I got this physically see the blunt force strama.
I mean they were murdered and stuffed in barrels, and
that that's just one that that I really really want
to get that give that little girl her her name back.
(25:28):
We have four children, and the youngest ones were about
the same age as some of those victims, so that
that one really struck struck home. But that's it's the
same emotional response really with all these these cases, and
it gives me. That's just the literally drives me to
do this type of work because at these it's it's
(25:50):
somebody's somebody's daughter, I mean, somebody's son, somebody's somebody's mom,
somebody's dad. These cases that we're working on, it's not
it's not just a pile of bone. It's somebody that
deserves the dignity of their identity back. And there's a
family that's out there have been frozen and uncertainty for
sometimes five, ten, fifteen, twenty years, and these are you know,
(26:13):
the coldest of the cold cases. So have the ability
to answer those questions and relieve some of that just
the emotional trauma is It is a very rewarding job,
but that's not why we do it.
Speaker 1 (26:33):
You have had some success, and so have some of
your students in class with you. Can you talk a
little bit about some of the cases that were solved
because of y'all's efforts.
Speaker 2 (26:43):
There's a great one we have. Her name was Stephanie
Cassada from Southgate, California. Now, we ended up with the
with the skull. We were I think our case managers
were in touch with the medical examiner out there, and
this around the time we had a new we upgraded
(27:05):
our technology. We did our We don't work in clay
there at the office. We do have a software that
reads that CT scan of the skull and imports it
into the software and you know, the skulls floating around
there in that virtual space, so we do it. That's
that way. We're digital now. But we had we had
that new technology and the medical examiner investigator had this
(27:29):
skull that they had a composite was done, a two
D composite and pencil was done for the case when
it was salt when it was originally found discovered, but
it was three years earlier, so the skull was still
there and there was no leads, no phone calls had
resulted from that sketch that they had done. So the
medical examiners say, hey, you have a new technology, want
(27:51):
you to take this one and see what you see
what you can do with it. So we went through
the process. We had doctor David Hunt, our anthropologists come
in assess the skull and then they did actually send
the physical skull to us. And then doctor Hunt had
a CT scanner. He actually worked at the Smithsonian Museum
in DC and they had a CT scanner there, so
(28:13):
he would he was a full service he was a
board certified forensic anthropologist and he would go and take
the skull to be scanned. So when he when he
got there, he pulls the skull out of the box,
he said, this is a you know, it's fascinating. I
don't know if you've ever set with a forensic anthropologist
and listen to what they can say by just holding
a skull on her hand absolutely, So he's he's got
(28:36):
my pencil and paper out and he said, okay, this
is a you know, we start start the timer. He said,
this is a black Hispanic female, late teens, early twenties.
He pulls a pencil out of his pocket and he's
stabbing it inside the nasal aperture and kind of just
just tapping it around, poking until he's got his thinking
cap on. But it's for me. It seemed like a long,
(28:59):
long silence, you know, like cue of the Jeopardy music,
because I'm wait for him to say something. So he
puts his pencil. Finally, he puts his pencil back in
his pocket and he sets the skull down. He snaps
his fingers. He's Dion Warwick. I remember I had my
pencil in my hand and I actually put a D
on the beat. I was like, wait a minute, you
told me that's Dion Warwick's skulls Like, I'm like, you're
(29:20):
horrible at this. I'm pretty sure she's still alive. And
he's like, no, no, no, no, I'm telling you this
is this person has Dion Warwick's nos. Yeah, so think
about how many millions of faces have you seen in
your lifetime and doctor Hunt is looking at this skull
and he's looking at the nasal aperture and he's like, oh, yeah,
(29:41):
that's I see Dion Warwick's nose there. So the best
way to can explain what doctor Hunt, or you know,
a forensic anthro policy says, when they they've looked at
so many skulls, they're done with the facial approximation in
their head. Instantly they can they can see that, and
that's that's what he's able to do. He's looking at
a skull and he sees Dion Warwick's news, which that's
(30:03):
just mind boggling to me. So go through the process.
And because I didn't know who Dion Warwick was, thank
god for Google Images, so I pulled up he found
the pictures. Like, that's that's what our nose looks like. So,
you know, black, Hispanic female, late teens, early twenties, Dion
Warwick's news. It's a lot of detail I had in
front of me. So I go through the process, put
(30:25):
the put the face together. Now, the investigator and the
medical examiner planned a like a press conference to introduce
this new image for this for this cold case. So
they targeted the area around where the body was found.
And the first stop on the media tour was in
like a town hall setting where a local city councilmen
(30:46):
were vi to tend the press conference. Basically it was
in their in their building, so they're setting up the meeting.
They'd blown up the image that I created and you know,
sitting on the easel in front of the room, and
one of the city councilman were the first one person
to walk into the room. He walked over, helped himself
to a cup of coffee and a donut, walked over
(31:07):
to the investigator and a medical examiner who was standing
in front of the blown up picture that I had,
the image that I created for this case, and he's like, hey,
it's this meeting about Stephanie Casada. Wow. So the investigators
like puzzled and looking at him. It's like, I'm sorry,
I don't know what you're talking about. And he's like, well,
hold on a second. So he sat set his coffee
and doughnut down and just walked out of the room
(31:28):
and they're kind of looking around and it was like anybody.
Speaker 1 (31:30):
Know who that was?
Speaker 2 (31:31):
Like, what's he just talking about? So he walked over
across the hall to his office, walked into his office,
pulled down a missing person's flyer, and he helped the
Casada family pass out, you know, three years earlier, because
she was missing from his district, and I believe the
family was out in front, you know, passing out flyers,
(31:53):
and he took one and taped it to the wall
in his office. So member goes back to that this
last I checked. There's eight billion people on the planet
and the right person has to see it. Well, this
councilman was an expert on Stephanie's face because he stared
at it every day for three years. So he pulled
it off the wall, walked back over and handed it
to the investigator. He goes, this is what I'm talking about. Now.
(32:14):
They got he's got a picture of Stephanie and the
stand in front of the picture I created. He's like,
holy cow, It's like you have my full attention now.
So wow, it was compelling enough. The investigator left, went back,
you know, did some research, found the Casata family, located them,
showed them that the picture and they agreed, yes, yes,
(32:34):
that looks like our daughter, and the mother identified artifacts
found with the remains. Mom consented to a DNA swab
An investigator quickly once got back to his office and
faxed over a copy for a driver's sciences record to
me to the National Center. I was in the lunch
room by myself, and the case manager walked in and
(32:55):
just slapped a piece of paper in front of me,
and I pick it up and immediately I was like, oh,
is this the case from California because it looked just
like the face I had sculpted. Then he proceeded to
tell me the story. It's like, we're just waiting for
a DNA you confirmation, and I was like, oh, sometimes
(33:15):
it takes longer than I would like. I'm a very
patient person, but I was still still excited of, you know,
seeing the similarity, so I was eager to get that
those results. So while we're waiting for those results, it's
still an active case, so it's still being disseminated, and
it's still on our website. Posters are being created, and
somehow it ended up taped to a lamp post there
(33:38):
in Southgate, California. So somebody saw it, pulled it off
the lamp post and called one eight hundred the Lost
and said, hey, I've got this poster here in front
of me. I know who this is. That's Stephanie Cassada,
and I know who shot her. So now two people
have seen that image that we created and given the
name Stephanie Casada, and that's now that family has has
(34:00):
those answers.
Speaker 1 (34:01):
And now I haven't.
Speaker 2 (34:03):
I hope I caught the guy who who did it
or individual person who did it. To me, that was
one of the cases really really shows the collaborative effort
that goes into this this process. You know, maybe might
find the investigator of the technology, the resources, the National
Center for Missing Sported Children, their website, the poster distribution,
(34:24):
the hotline, everybody, everybody come together to give that Cassada
family those answers that they did not have prior to
this this whole process. So that really just to me,
that was one of the more interesting success stories for
me personally. And that's that just says it all me minutes.
(34:48):
I've never met the Casada family, but again that's not
why we do it. But I would upon just give
him a hug and say, I hope you let's give
you some peace.
Speaker 1 (35:00):
Oh, you know, it gave them some answers and like
with the artifacts, you know, the jewelry, the clothing. You know,
they know it's her, And I've heard more than one family.
You know, they always say the not knowing is just
so excruciating, So there is some comfort in the knowledge
that you gave them.
Speaker 2 (35:19):
I heard you talk about that, the not knowing aspect
from Revee Walsh, and I heard those exact words from
John Walsh years ago when Americas was one and was
still filming. They came into film an episode there at
the National Center and I was on camera. John was
they were just we were just showcasing what we do
(35:41):
there in the forensic imaging and talking about the age progressions.
So I was I was nervous, so I think it
was my first time on Americans. Was wanted sweating profusely,
probably the worst media interview ever. So John was just great,
very very relaxing. So the cameras rolling comes in. Here's
Joe Mullins, one of our forensic image of specialist. Here,
(36:03):
Joe wants you to explain which we do here. So
I'm clicking through the demo talk about h progression and
to get to a picture of a skull. And I say,
here with skulls that we stop bringing home a live
child at least we provide closure for families. John, I
don't think I get the word out of my mouth.
John walls shoes up and yells cut. So he kind
of spun my chair around, had a gray suit, white
(36:26):
shirt and red tie on. He's leaning over and he's
said to Joe, it's like people say that all the time,
you know, the closure. I don't. I don't like that word.
It's like I'm never, never going to forget my son,
he said. A better way to explain the service that
the National Centers providing with these with these images is
you're providing answers to families, he said, because not knowing
(36:48):
as a nightmare, you can't wake up. Oh that was
probably over twenty years ago and make a point to
tell that story and in this realm. I've that was
the last time I ever said close, because he has
every right to. I think that was a perfect explanation
and that was one of the as the top five
(37:09):
moments of my career there at the National Center. At
that moment with John Moss, that was very humbling.
Speaker 1 (37:15):
No, that's pretty good education, right there, no question. And
you know that family, I mean, what they have done
through their tragedy is beyond. But one thing that I
always just knocks me out when I think of, you know,
Ms Walsh when they're doing the story of Adam and
(37:38):
they're going to make this movie and she insists that
current missing children be highlighted at the end. And you know,
that's one of those things. You know, as a mama,
you think she should be so uber focused on her
child and what happened to him and the answers that
(37:59):
they deserve. Yet she's not. She's focused on as many
as she possibly can. So again, you know, you have
aligned yourself with I think some of the most extraordinary
people that are out there because of their capacity to
love and to give and to honor.
Speaker 2 (38:18):
I owe it to Adam and the Walsh family to
do everything I can. So No, every family has answers
and every child is brought home. I feel like that's
my that's my job. That's why I love marking. No.
Speaker 1 (38:39):
You asked if I had ever had the opportunity to
deal with an anthropologist. Well, again, here in Georgia we
have doctor Alice Gooden, and she, hands down, has provided
some of the best training that I've had in the
last forty years. Hands down, I mean she takes us
(39:01):
out in the woods. We're going to excavate, you know,
a body of a hog, and we're going to do
it right, whether it's raining or snowing or in the
case of my class of tornado warning was underway. And
then I had the opportunity to go to the body
Farm and train with doctor Donnie Steadman and Tennessee. Yes, yeah,
(39:26):
And if you ever want to feel like, you know,
academically you are subpar, go spend some time with doctor Stedman.
Good lord, you know, you just leave there just knowing,
you know, her IQ is a little bit higher than yours.
But anyway, phenomenal. But here's one thing that I learned
that I had never thought about prior to that training,
(39:48):
and that training was ten years ago. She talked specifically
about skulls from people that had a mixed ethnic background,
and so she was saying, the skin made tell you
one thing, but the skull is going to tell you another.
And so she used, like Keanu Reeves and halle Berry
and President Obama, that if you only had the skull,
(40:10):
you may not come up with the same outward appearance.
Have you ever run across that where you were not
certain of how to portray the skull.
Speaker 2 (40:22):
Oh yeah, I mean it's even with the best forensic
anthropologies out there, which I feel like I have the
opportunity to work with a lot of them, sometimes they're
I don't think doctor Hunt liked this assessment or explanation.
Just to keep I keep things simple. So forensic anthropology
(40:42):
works with the majority rules. So they've looked at, you know,
a thousand skulls and they found eight hundred and fifty.
This is this is how these features translate into you know,
from a skull feature into the soft tissue of an
actual face and everything from you know, of the ad mixtures.
(41:02):
You know, it's like the stepty black Hispanic or white black,
you know, all the ad mixtures are different variations. But
it doesn't put in a right face on there is
I mean, it's it's certainly not it's not an exact science,
not the downplay there, but it's sometimes you have to
(41:23):
do the best with what the information you have and
go go forward from there and still with that hopes
that you've got some feature right that somebody can see
it and say, you know, hey, that's that kind of
looks like my you know, uncle, I haven't seen him
in ten years, and that's that's really the best that
counts as a success in our book. That's back to that.
(41:45):
The almost is almost as good enough. But when you
start breaking down to the skulls, there's lots of skulls
that have the ancestry, and there's difference between you know, race, ethnicity,
and ancestry. So think of a bag of jelly beans.
So race would be the color of the jelly bean,
(42:07):
Ethnicity would be the flavor of the jelly bean. An
ancestry would be the factory where the jelly beans were made.
So when you're looking at a skull, you're thinking about
it was more ancestry, just the facts. But as we
start putting that face on there, so say it's like
a black Hispanic. Now Hispanic is an ethnicity, not a race,
but that's a term that most people are familiar with.
(42:30):
Makes that switch from ances street can now I say,
we have to get to hit that target that parameters
of the details we have in front of us. So
it has to look like a Hispanic person, or it
has to look or it has to look like a
Caucasian person. It's a balance sometimes like how far do
you take the details or how you have to work
(42:51):
with a restricted artistic license. Basically, you have to let
the skull tell you. If the skull or the anthropologist
isn't in telling you what to do, then you you
can't do it. I can't do it. I can't go
off the rails and put on my artistic hat and
make it look pretty not accurate.
Speaker 1 (43:09):
And that's the deal. We're back to that team. We're
back to those people that you trust to tell you
this is what you have and that's all you can
you know, put into your work.
Speaker 2 (43:18):
There's been cases with you know, the three main ancestor
groups are are black, White, and Asian, and there's been
you know, hundreds of skulls that have had all three
of those characteristics. So what how do you how do
you represent that face? You know, with the ad mixture
you touched on you like COUNTA Reeves, President Obama, Helly Berry.
Those are all great beautiful faces, you know, but that's
(43:43):
that's there's a lot of the ad mixture. So it's stuff.
So for us, we always like checks and Ballet will
do a buddy check or ask our fellow artists to
take a look at it. We'll send it back to
whatever anthropologist or medical exammer we're working with just to
make sure we're put in that right face, the best
face out there, because ultimately, as a forensic artist, we're
(44:04):
the last phone call. They've they've exhausted every other resource
at their disposal and they bring it to us. So
we've got to make we've got to get it right
and put the best face out there and over the
accurate face that helps, that sparks that recognition.
Speaker 1 (44:20):
Yeah, your job is like mine. I'm the last one called,
and I think you know, I tell people all the time,
I'm not a first responder. I'm a last responder, and
I think there's not only a little pressure added sometimes,
but I think there's a great responsibility because we are
the last shot.
Speaker 2 (44:37):
That's why I mean, I'm gonna do my job. I can't.
There's never been a time in twenty five years I've
woken up like I have to go to work today
and that feeling of dread, it's always that thought has
never crossed my mind. That's if I don't do my
job right, that's that family might not ever get the answer,
so that that child might not ever get home. So
(45:02):
I always do my job as to the best of
my abilities and make sure I ever become complacent and
always always a better way to do it. So hopefully
I'm always learning and improving, and I'll keep doing it.
I was joking with somebody recently at work, so have
you been there for twenty five years? I guess it's
(45:25):
like I think I'm probably gonna be one of those
people just die at my desk. That'd be okay with me.
Speaker 1 (45:32):
I would die happy, sure, understood, understood. People ask me
all the time, you're not retired for what I ain't
made to fish all day, Let's go. I want to
get in the middle of it. Unfortunately we have that,
And you know, I tell people all the time, you
know you you need to be so grateful when somebody
(45:54):
says they love what they do, when it's something that
other people just can't. I mean, Joe, we can not
do what you do. I'm never going to be an artist.
I'm never going to be able to draw or pain
or sculpt or any of that. But you know, thank
the good Lord, you not only can do it, but
are willing to use it in this way.
Speaker 2 (46:14):
Very fortunate. My mom always says, you shit early on
in my career. I'm so proud of you, So you
do it. Art art with a purpose, That is what
it is. I can't stress enough how important it is
to take take a moment and look at those pictures.
And we get so busy doing everything else in our
(46:35):
in our lives and get distracted. But that I said
early on, everything we create, it doesn't work unless the
right person sees it. So take a moment to share
those images on social media. We get out as many
people as possible, because if you haven't gone through that's
(46:57):
the trauma or horrible now of not knowing where your
child is. That's it's a horrible thing and we don't
want anybody to go through that just because we haven't
gone through it. I think that's just something that we
need to reassure ourselves and make sure that we don't
(47:19):
ever have to go through that, and make sure do
everything we can to help those that are going through
it by being more proactive looking at those pictures, you know,
picking up the phone, call, if you see something, do something,
you make a difference, get involved. Don't let any you know,
skull sit on a shelf unidentified, or let some little
(47:41):
boy or little girl get abducted and take it away
from their family for five, ten, fifteen years. That's doesn't
have to be that way. I think we can all
pitch in and let's get all the children home and
all the skulls identified. I'm gonna keep doing it until
somebody tells me to sty or my wife fakes me retire.
Speaker 1 (48:02):
Well, Joe Mowens, I cannot thank you enough for being
with us on Zone seven tonight, and I can't thank
you enough for being a part of my Zone seven.
Speaker 2 (48:10):
This has been truly amazing. I've been looking forward to
this for some time now, and anything, anything you need
from me, you just let me know and I'll I'll
get it done.
Speaker 1 (48:21):
Well. I appreciate you, and we're going to add a
link to this episode that goes straight to some of
your work so people can start looking at these faces
and hopefully let's bring somebody home. As Joe has said
multiple times, it just takes one person, the right person
to see the right image and then we have something solid.
Speaker 2 (48:43):
Yeah, that's all it takes. Just be that one person.
Speaker 1 (48:47):
Be that one person. Amen. I'm going to end Zone
seven the way that I always do with a quote.
At first, it was a bit eerie for the students
as they unpacked the skull Replicans. What about four days
into the class, something changed. Students were no longer looking
at a skull, a relatively abstract concept of a human,
(49:10):
but a person. John Volt, director of the New York
Academy of Art. I'm Cheryl McCollum, and this is Zone seven.
It was about two thousand and five, two thousand and six.
I was shopping for some toys for my children when
I saw this kit and it was a green box
with big letters that said CSI and then it said
Forensic Facial Reconstruction Kit. Now, it was clearly designed as
an educational toy. I would save from twelve to fourteen
(00:33):
and up. But I thought my students at the college
would love this kind of as a side project. And
my thought forgetting this whole thing started with them was
for them to learn what actually goes into these facial reconstructions.
You start with just a skull, and then you've got
(00:55):
to take great time and care to put together this face,
these eyebrows, these ears, these lips. It takes a minute. Now,
I'm going to tell you all the truth. By the
time my students got finished, our person just looked like
this sexy pirate. They had all kinds of names for
him that I will spare y'all, but just know they
(01:15):
were hilarious Captain so and so and whatnot. But what
they did learn, these non artists is the time that
it takes, the understanding that it takes to look at
just a skull and then try to create this missing person.
It was one of the best exercises ever, even though
(01:36):
it was just a toy. Tonight we got the real deal.
We got Joe Mullins. This is part of our Legend series,
and when I say legend, I mean it. One of
the most important thing Joe is doing with his time
and talents. He's teaching the next generation. For twenty five years,
(01:59):
he has created images that have helped id people that
have gone missing, those that have been recovered with no name.
Joe has studied at the Savannah Art of College and Design.
He attended the FBI Academy. He also uses his skills
to predict what famous people's children might look like. In
(02:20):
twenty twelve, he predicted what Cap Middleton and Prince William's
children might look like, which I find extraordinary. He is
part of the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children
and I do not think his talent could be utilized
any better. The power of art in cold cases was
(02:40):
in full force at this year's Crime con Let me
tell y'all something about Booth twenty five. I have never
in my life witnessed just a miracle in action. Joe's talent,
his god given gift, in my opinion, was on full display.
(03:01):
He takes a skull day one, and by the time
that crime con is finished, there is a person, There
is a face, there is somebody so recognizable. If you
know this person, that this case is going to be
solved by that person getting their name back. So ladies
(03:21):
and gentlemen, please help me welcome Joe Mullins.
Speaker 2 (03:25):
Sure, thank you so much. That was one of the
more flattering introductions I think I've ever received in my career.
Thank you. I was smiling ear to ear over here.
Speaker 1 (03:36):
Well, I'm telling you my daughter Caroline and I you
saw us multiple times at crime Con. I couldn't even
speak to you. I didn't even want to interrupt for
one second. Your genius because what I was watching was
just beyond anything I had ever seen. And you are
talented and you can sculp, there's no question about it.
(03:56):
But when you're talking about here's a skulp, and if
you had fifty of them, can you really see a
whole lot of differences? You know what I mean. But
you took it, and here's what I saw. In my mind.
I'm thinking that skull is evidence. How does he have
that skull? So let's talk about that first, Where and
(04:17):
how do you have these skulls?
Speaker 2 (04:19):
There's a lot of that goes on behind the scenes
to pull off, you know, being there at crime Con
it was one of four full time forensic artists at
the National Center for missaink Sported Children. It took the
whole team to pull that off. And what's because ultimately
I can't investigators, medical examiners don't want do you want
(04:43):
me to travel with a human remains an actual skull.
So we've utilized the technology as available today, so we
use a Sometimes you have to exhume the remains and
work with the investigators, the Emmy's office corners, and then
find now that we have this goal and now we
need to get a scan done of it. So we
(05:05):
circle the around with the AME's offices and find a
hospital that's willing to donate their time and energy to
do a CT scan of a skull. And that's always
an interesting phone call talking to some calling cold calling
the radiology department and explaining I'm a forensic artist, Can
I come scan a skull at your CT scanner. Once
we get all those ducks in a row, then it's
(05:28):
just a matter of getting then facilitating a three D
print of the skull and then going through the process
of you know, reconstructing the face you know, back on
there and hopes to get that victim identified. So there's
even that was a you know, a shortened version of
everything that goes into pulling pulling those events off. But
it's it's such an amazing response to especially there at
(05:52):
crime Con that we got. It was. It was humbling.
I my co workers. You We talked to Cal Walsh.
Uh he was joking, it's like, well, you're just like I,
you know, sort of a you know, celebrities, like this
is your You're stealing the spotlight here. It's all all
about you now. It was it was just amazing. That
(06:14):
was I couldn't ask for a better response from the
attendees there at the crime Con because that's not where
they They were only interesting and listening to every hanging
on every word that I was saying as I was
explaining what I was doing and the nuances of the skull.
But they were truly I think everybody that I talked
to came back around on that last day to take
(06:34):
pictures of the finished facial approximation to help, you know,
blast it out on social media to help get get
her identified. It was truly amazing. So it's very very
humbling experience.
Speaker 1 (06:48):
And again Callahan Walsh could not have been more gracious
and genuine and hey, please come back and take a
picture like he was promoting the whole thing as well,
which to me, the team you're talking about is one
of the most important things that you can have in
order for you to be able to do what you
need to do.
Speaker 2 (07:09):
Yeah, everybody there, you know, had Christy, you had two
artists there. Christy was showcasing our age progression technology there
and she was just as swamped as I was with
people interested in seeing what we were doing. And really
everybody else was helping because I couldn't talk to everybody,
so cal would jump in. We had you know, Reggie,
(07:31):
you know what, Christine There's everybody was there was helping
explain what I was doing. So we had that much,
We had that many people that we needed to that
we grab their attention with that type of presentation that
we were doing. It was just I was blown away.
I'm I'm still blown away just you know, talking about
it now and just kind of reliving it. It was
(07:52):
It was truly amazing. I think that's that case. It's
going to get solved because of the attends and the
tension that it got.
Speaker 1 (08:02):
And how in the world do you ever meet or
work with, or just be in the vicinity of Angeline
Hartman and not fall in love with her.
Speaker 2 (08:12):
Won't even know where to begin. See, I'm in a
loss for words. Held just amazing she is, and not
only a friend, she's such such an advocate and supporter
of what we do, you know, working with the media
team there at the National Center, the Forensic Imaging Unit
has it's a very visual unit and it gets a
lot of media attention, as it should, and we wanted
(08:34):
to have to see that in an egotistical way, but
we want Carara doesn't have to be on me. We
want it to be it on these these age progressions
or these facial approximations we're doing. They're interesting stories and
we can use that to our advantage to get them
out to as many eyes as possible, and Angeline is
always seeing the benefit of that, and it's just she
(08:55):
produced a video with one of the classes I did
at the New York Academy of Art back in twenty fifteen,
and I was there it was my class and after
watching her video and she put made me cry.
Speaker 1 (09:09):
She's extraordinary.
Speaker 2 (09:10):
I have Angeline, you know, my fellow artists, everybody at
the National Center at I mean been there twenty five years.
There everybody says it's like family. It's more than family
that those it's the people with the shared compassion of
helping missing and exploited children. It's just just an amazing
(09:31):
experience to be around those people.
Speaker 1 (09:34):
You know. I tell people all the time when they
ask me, how after forty years have you not burnt out?
Your answer is the reason because I'm surrounded by heroes.
Every day. I literally get to watch the best that
there is operate, and I don't know how in the
world you would ever burn out from that. So I
hear you. I mean, I know who you're working with.
(09:56):
Callahan Walsh is one of my favorite people. Angeline Heartman.
I mean, I've known her for years and years and
she has only gotten better. I mean, it's remarkable. And
then of course you, you know, making you a part of
my Zone seven was so easy, you know, not just
and again, not just the skill. It's not like you're
just watching the best that there is. When you talk
(10:18):
about compassion. That's not something you can teach. And I
would imagine that you and your students from New York
to Virginia to Florida. You know, most of these folks
that have a gift in being a sculptor, they probably
never as a child, thought I'm going to be involved
in solving a cold case. But yet here they're offering
(10:41):
their time and talents in a way that was never
on their radar. But because they do care, here they.
Speaker 2 (10:49):
Are teaching is something that I never really thought that
I would get into career wise, but it is. I
think it's the cool I always say, with annoying frequency,
the coolest job in the world being able to teach.
And there's a moll mark and see everybody's their interests.
You know, day one, it's you know, kind of explaining
the class, but as the as the week, depending on
(11:11):
the workshop or class that I'm doing the full semester.
But there's a time where there's a switch that goes
off and everybody it's really the time when the face
starts to develop on the skull that they're working on.
It's not just a skull now, it's a person, and
there's just a mood swing in the whole room where
everybody is silent or getting real close to their the
face that their sculpting there are attacked and they get it.
(11:35):
There's a switch that goes on they have and that
for me, that was like, I feel like I've done
something just like you said, It's it's inspiring to me
to be able to pass that on because I'm the
passion and the compassion and the energy that I you
know give, you know, like, it's just truly amazing to
be able to pass that on. And it's a it's
(11:55):
such a unique field and very few of us out there,
so having the opportunity to pass it on to the
next generation we need artists, don't let the technology hasn't
come that far yet, whether it's an easy button or
AI generated facial approximations might get there one day. Whether
it's not there yet.
Speaker 1 (12:19):
Well, let's talk about how this job can be difficult.
So with the skull, I understand there's like twenty three
separate bones. Oftentimes with crime you're going to have some
blunt borce trauma. You get to have a bullet hole,
you could have a knife wound, all of these unique issues.
How do you go about starting this face with this skull,
(12:42):
where do you personally start?
Speaker 2 (12:44):
That's definitely one of the more horrific aspects of being
a friends of artists. When somebody's asking me what I do.
They're doing mostly intrigued with the the process and the
end results, but what really goes on behind the scenes,
you know, the reality is that we're dealing with you
know this, these children, especially there at the day job
there at the National Center for Missing Exported Children, and
(13:04):
I was holding a skull of a ten year old
with you know, multiple gunshots or blunt force trauma. It
could go on and all kinds of horrible adjectives to
describe to that, but that just, I guess, motivates me
to help give this this person their identity back and
(13:28):
work on that face. As an artist, I'm approaching it
as you know, my fine art, you know, painting, drawing, sculpting.
The foundation helped get me in the door, but it's
really working side by side with the medical examiner and
particularly a forensic anthropologist. Now, the forensic anthropologist is one
who adds the science aspect of it, because there's that
(13:48):
combination of art and science, and that's where the science
comes from. Where they pick up the skull and can
tell you amazing details about you know, the age range,
the ancestry, female, and just all the distinguishing characteristics, everything
that makes you you, It is etched into your skull.
So it's you know, said all this had fifty skulls,
(14:09):
so that'd be fifty different faces. There's so many details
that are involved in reconstructing the face, and it's just
fascinating to me that all that translates into your soft tissue,
because you think about it, your your skull is the
foundation that you are built on. It's it's everything that's
holding up. Everything about you is under underneath there that
(14:33):
skulls holding it up. So you know, to translate that
and put the reconstruct that face back on there is
And sometimes I'm just amazed at how when we see
the when these cases are resolved, when we get to
see photographs of what these people look like in life,
it is just mind boggling how how accurate some of
(14:56):
these faces are. It's just I just love love my job.
I think it's doing doing God's work, I guess for
I think this is what I was meant meant to do.
Speaker 1 (15:06):
Yeah, I don't think there's any doubt about it. And
anybody that got to watch you at crime Con saw it,
felt it, understood it. It was absolutely undeniable what we
were watching. When do you start to really see the face,
Like not just I'm in the process of molding a
cheekbone or I'm going to put some eyebrows, but when
(15:29):
do you know that person is looking back at you.
Speaker 2 (15:31):
The starting point is it's just now, it's just a skull,
and I have, you know, the facts in front of me.
It's a Caucasian female, late teens, early twenties. And then
as I start, you know, basically work from the top down,
scope the muscles first and add the tissue depth markers
to get the landmarks for how much flesh to put
on the skull. And I worked from the top down,
(15:53):
so it's typically by time I get the forehead and
I set the eyes in the orbits and draw the
irises on and I know scp the nose. That's when
it's it's not a skull. And now there's there's a
set of eyes, you know, staring back at me. And
to add to that, and so I know, the question
was like, how do you know when you're done? So
when I have to put that last It's like an
(16:15):
artist or a painter when you put that last brush brushstrokes,
Like when do you put your brush downs? Like how
do you know when you're done? And I said, for me,
I stop when I see somebody staring back at me.
So that's it happens with every single case.
Speaker 1 (16:28):
We get that.
Speaker 2 (16:29):
I get that same same feelings right by the time
I get the eyes and then the nose on and
because that's sorts of fill out the face, and then
it's I think I probably go faster at that point
because then I just want to I just want to
see that completed face.
Speaker 1 (16:46):
Well, I know at Crome Con, I was watching you
for a little bit and you were taking so just
great care and concern right at the cheek, and then
you went down and you probably spent I don't know,
I want to say, ten minutes just on the left
side of the jawline, and you kept just smoothing and
(17:06):
smoothing with this little instrument. I mean, it just looked
like almost a flat rock and you were barely touching it,
but it did change that expression. It was the most
unbelievable thing. And I know Carolina, and I kept saying,
I want to ask him all these questions, but I
just didn't want to bust into your rhythm. And I thought,
(17:28):
I'm just glad to snatch him later because I just
have to know some things. So why don't you tell us?
You know, why are lips so difficult for a sculpture?
Speaker 2 (17:38):
For it was kind of eye opening for me when
I started teaching classes. I teach a graduate class at
George Mason University in the forensic science department. These aren't
they're not necessarily artists. These are a crime see investigators.
But they they take this class and the one, the
(18:00):
one feature that I know that everybody struggled with that's
not really a sculptor or an artist's lips. Lips seemed
to be the most across the board, the most difficult
feature to sculpt. Blew my mind. I was just like,
why it's lips? Like it was like I remember hating ears.
But I I'm a sculptor, artist by by trade, so
I've conquered conquered that pretty quickly. But it's always it's
(18:24):
always the lips, you know, you think about it, it's it.
It's a very simple. I think it looks like a
very simple formed to sculpt. But I think that's why
it's so it's it's so subtle that people either overdo
it and you get like I get a lot of
duck clips, like puckered up clips.
Speaker 1 (18:43):
Just grabbing the play and squeezing it.
Speaker 2 (18:45):
Yeah, so they grab so I used I came up
with an example of I'm trying to I was wondering,
why is it across the board. The first of all,
they're very flat, their flat lips, and they and everybody
pinched pinches their fingers to get like a real sharp
edge around around to I guess to find the outline
(19:07):
of the lips. But if we were if I would
have asked you right now to draw a set of lips,
that's exactly what you would draw, just a line, be
like the just a very simple basic drawing. But that
that is what people think lips look like. And then
if they draw it that way, that's how they're going
to sculpt. It's very flat and has that that puckered
(19:28):
up that's an outline. Fascinating to me that the lips
is always such a struggle. It's all go Usually on
lip day, what it's called lip service day, I go
we have a practice exercise and make them sculpt the
set of lips just outside of the you know, different
(19:48):
separated from the work that they're doing for their their skull,
and I say, if you're gonna do anything horrible or wrong,
do it, do it on this practice set of lips.
Then we go through and do it on the actual
skull and it's all basically the rest of the day
for that day when it we're doing ellipse, all I
do is usually max out around fifteen students. All I
(20:09):
do is sculpt, keep sculpting lips over and over because
I'll gather nobody around and demonstrate on how to do
it on the skull that I'm working on. I was like, Okay,
we're going to go back and try it, and then
from that moment on, I'm just fixing, fixing the lips
the entire class.
Speaker 1 (20:29):
That's amazing. Well, as you know, I have the opportunity
and the gift of working with Kelly Lawson with the
Georgia Bureau of Investigation, and if it's a victim that
I've taken to her that has witnessed something or was
a victim of something that she's going to describe the perpetrator.
Kelly normally asked them, does this person remind you of
(20:52):
anybody famous? Like, is there a base I can start with?
And I find the way that she takes somebody that
you know maybe says yes, they look like X, Y
or Z. Then she starts to start drawing as they're talking,
and of course the eyebrows are imported in the ears
and the nose in the mouth and all that, and
(21:13):
before long, like you say, there is somebody staring back
at her, and the victim can then kind of, you know,
craft and move and change slightly to alter it until
they get to the person. And that's when the victim
or the witness goes, that's him, you know, or that's her.
(21:34):
You don't have that ability. You don't have that gift
of having somebody say, well, this is what they look like.
You're working from literally nothing and then hoping that what
you have come up with looks like a missing person.
Speaker 2 (21:51):
I have to give credits credit. Kelly and her mom,
Marla are two of the most talented artists I've ever seen,
and of composite drawings that they do unbelievable and of
course remarkably successful with those images. But just like the
composite sketches, they do. We always say, as we as
(22:14):
do these, We're never going to come up with a
portrait of what that who that person that victim is
describing to the Kelly and I'm never going to come
up with a exact likeness of what this victim look like,
you know, sculpting working for a skull, But we found
forensic arts. One of my good friends and mentor, Steve Mankouzi,
(22:37):
was retired NYPD composite artist. Still his quote he said,
as a forensic artist, we live in a wonderful world
of almost is good enough where we don't have to
come up with the portraits. But still the main key
to everything we do as friends of art with composite
sketches or facial approximations, it doesn't work unless the right
(22:57):
person sees it. So the works that Kelly does, you know,
the drawings like somebody's that the victim says, that's that's him.
Now they have to take that back and match it
up to you know, like mug shots or you know,
rest photos, or do their due diligence. But that's it's
the same process with these facial approximations. We want I
(23:18):
want to get it out through as many eyes as
possible and help get these victims identified, help get those
those bad guys off the street, all because of forensic art.
So it's that's why, I'm sure sure Kelly probably says
the same thing. She's got the coolest, coolest job in
the world. She gets to help bad guys and help
the answer some questions for families. It's pretty cool.
Speaker 1 (23:42):
It is pretty cool. Is there a case that sticks
with you, like, is there a skull where maybe you've
gotten a face looking back at you, but nobody reported
a child missing that fits that in that area or.
Speaker 2 (23:57):
Back when we would actually receive the skulls and in
the mayo when it would ship into us and we did,
there was that. It's just a horrible the blunt force trauma.
There was the case they would call it the the
barrel case. I was a mom and two of her
daughters and there was a third.
Speaker 1 (24:21):
Child.
Speaker 2 (24:23):
So the mother and her two daughters ended up getting identified.
It was a Terry rass Mussen. That's serial killer. It
is from Vermont. So the the mom and her two
daughters got identified, but there was that third child who
do DNA. They realized that it was the father was
(24:45):
the killer. But they still don't know, they don't know
who she is. And that's that case is just we
have you know, there's four victims, we have three of
the four. I really want to give that poor little
girl her name back. That was one that sticks with me.
(25:06):
I think it was mostly because we actually that's back
when we I got this physically see the blunt force strama.
I mean they were murdered and stuffed in barrels, and
that that's just one that that I really really want
to get that give that little girl her her name back.
(25:28):
We have four children, and the youngest ones were about
the same age as some of those victims, so that
that one really struck struck home. But that's it's the
same emotional response really with all these these cases, and
it gives me. That's just the literally drives me to
do this type of work because at these it's it's
(25:50):
somebody's somebody's daughter, I mean, somebody's son, somebody's somebody's mom,
somebody's dad. These cases that we're working on, it's not
it's not just a pile of bone. It's somebody that
deserves the dignity of their identity back. And there's a
family that's out there have been frozen and uncertainty for
sometimes five, ten, fifteen, twenty years, and these are you know,
(26:13):
the coldest of the cold cases. So have the ability
to answer those questions and relieve some of that just
the emotional trauma is It is a very rewarding job,
but that's not why we do it.
Speaker 1 (26:33):
You have had some success, and so have some of
your students in class with you. Can you talk a
little bit about some of the cases that were solved
because of y'all's efforts.
Speaker 2 (26:43):
There's a great one we have. Her name was Stephanie
Cassada from Southgate, California. Now, we ended up with the
with the skull. We were I think our case managers
were in touch with the medical examiner out there, and
this around the time we had a new we upgraded
(27:05):
our technology. We did our We don't work in clay
there at the office. We do have a software that
reads that CT scan of the skull and imports it
into the software and you know, the skulls floating around
there in that virtual space, so we do it. That's
that way. We're digital now. But we had we had
that new technology and the medical examiner investigator had this
(27:29):
skull that they had a composite was done, a two
D composite and pencil was done for the case when
it was salt when it was originally found discovered, but
it was three years earlier, so the skull was still
there and there was no leads, no phone calls had
resulted from that sketch that they had done. So the
medical examiners say, hey, you have a new technology, want
(27:51):
you to take this one and see what you see
what you can do with it. So we went through
the process. We had doctor David Hunt, our anthropologists come
in assess the skull and then they did actually send
the physical skull to us. And then doctor Hunt had
a CT scanner. He actually worked at the Smithsonian Museum
in DC and they had a CT scanner there, so
(28:13):
he would he was a full service he was a
board certified forensic anthropologist and he would go and take
the skull to be scanned. So when he when he
got there, he pulls the skull out of the box,
he said, this is a you know, it's fascinating. I
don't know if you've ever set with a forensic anthropologist
and listen to what they can say by just holding
a skull on her hand absolutely, So he's he's got
(28:36):
my pencil and paper out and he said, okay, this
is a you know, we start start the timer. He said,
this is a black Hispanic female, late teens, early twenties.
He pulls a pencil out of his pocket and he's
stabbing it inside the nasal aperture and kind of just
just tapping it around, poking until he's got his thinking
cap on. But it's for me. It seemed like a long,
(28:59):
long silence, you know, like cue of the Jeopardy music,
because I'm wait for him to say something. So he
puts his pencil. Finally, he puts his pencil back in
his pocket and he sets the skull down. He snaps
his fingers. He's Dion Warwick. I remember I had my
pencil in my hand and I actually put a D
on the beat. I was like, wait a minute, you
told me that's Dion Warwick's skulls Like, I'm like, you're
(29:20):
horrible at this. I'm pretty sure she's still alive. And
he's like, no, no, no, no, I'm telling you this
is this person has Dion Warwick's nos. Yeah, so think
about how many millions of faces have you seen in
your lifetime and doctor Hunt is looking at this skull
and he's looking at the nasal aperture and he's like, oh, yeah,
(29:41):
that's I see Dion Warwick's nose there. So the best
way to can explain what doctor Hunt, or you know,
a forensic anthro policy says, when they they've looked at
so many skulls, they're done with the facial approximation in
their head. Instantly they can they can see that, and
that's that's what he's able to do. He's looking at
a skull and he sees Dion Warwick's news, which that's
(30:03):
just mind boggling to me. So go through the process.
And because I didn't know who Dion Warwick was, thank
god for Google Images, so I pulled up he found
the pictures. Like, that's that's what our nose looks like. So,
you know, black, Hispanic female, late teens, early twenties, Dion
Warwick's news. It's a lot of detail I had in
front of me. So I go through the process, put
(30:25):
the put the face together. Now, the investigator and the
medical examiner planned a like a press conference to introduce
this new image for this for this cold case. So
they targeted the area around where the body was found.
And the first stop on the media tour was in
like a town hall setting where a local city councilmen
(30:46):
were vi to tend the press conference. Basically it was
in their in their building, so they're setting up the meeting.
They'd blown up the image that I created and you know,
sitting on the easel in front of the room, and
one of the city councilman were the first one person
to walk into the room. He walked over, helped himself
to a cup of coffee and a donut, walked over
(31:07):
to the investigator and a medical examiner who was standing
in front of the blown up picture that I had,
the image that I created for this case, and he's like, hey,
it's this meeting about Stephanie Casada. Wow. So the investigators
like puzzled and looking at him. It's like, I'm sorry,
I don't know what you're talking about. And he's like, well,
hold on a second. So he sat set his coffee
and doughnut down and just walked out of the room
(31:28):
and they're kind of looking around and it was like anybody.
Speaker 1 (31:30):
Know who that was?
Speaker 2 (31:31):
Like, what's he just talking about? So he walked over
across the hall to his office, walked into his office,
pulled down a missing person's flyer, and he helped the
Casada family pass out, you know, three years earlier, because
she was missing from his district, and I believe the
family was out in front, you know, passing out flyers,
(31:53):
and he took one and taped it to the wall
in his office. So member goes back to that this
last I checked. There's eight billion people on the planet
and the right person has to see it. Well, this
councilman was an expert on Stephanie's face because he stared
at it every day for three years. So he pulled
it off the wall, walked back over and handed it
to the investigator. He goes, this is what I'm talking about. Now.
(32:14):
They got he's got a picture of Stephanie and the
stand in front of the picture I created. He's like,
holy cow, It's like you have my full attention now.
So wow, it was compelling enough. The investigator left, went back,
you know, did some research, found the Casata family, located them,
showed them that the picture and they agreed, yes, yes,
(32:34):
that looks like our daughter, and the mother identified artifacts
found with the remains. Mom consented to a DNA swab
An investigator quickly once got back to his office and
faxed over a copy for a driver's sciences record to
me to the National Center. I was in the lunch
room by myself, and the case manager walked in and
(32:55):
just slapped a piece of paper in front of me,
and I pick it up and immediately I was like, oh,
is this the case from California because it looked just
like the face I had sculpted. Then he proceeded to
tell me the story. It's like, we're just waiting for
a DNA you confirmation, and I was like, oh, sometimes
(33:15):
it takes longer than I would like. I'm a very
patient person, but I was still still excited of, you know,
seeing the similarity, so I was eager to get that
those results. So while we're waiting for those results, it's
still an active case, so it's still being disseminated, and
it's still on our website. Posters are being created, and
somehow it ended up taped to a lamp post there
(33:38):
in Southgate, California. So somebody saw it, pulled it off
the lamp post and called one eight hundred the Lost
and said, hey, I've got this poster here in front
of me. I know who this is. That's Stephanie Cassada,
and I know who shot her. So now two people
have seen that image that we created and given the
name Stephanie Casada, and that's now that family has has
(34:00):
those answers.
Speaker 1 (34:01):
And now I haven't.
Speaker 2 (34:03):
I hope I caught the guy who who did it
or individual person who did it. To me, that was
one of the cases really really shows the collaborative effort
that goes into this this process. You know, maybe might
find the investigator of the technology, the resources, the National
Center for Missing Sported Children, their website, the poster distribution,
(34:24):
the hotline, everybody, everybody come together to give that Cassada
family those answers that they did not have prior to
this this whole process. So that really just to me,
that was one of the more interesting success stories for
me personally. And that's that just says it all me minutes.
(34:48):
I've never met the Casada family, but again that's not
why we do it. But I would upon just give
him a hug and say, I hope you let's give
you some peace.
Speaker 1 (35:00):
Oh, you know, it gave them some answers and like
with the artifacts, you know, the jewelry, the clothing. You know,
they know it's her, And I've heard more than one family.
You know, they always say the not knowing is just
so excruciating, So there is some comfort in the knowledge
that you gave them.
Speaker 2 (35:19):
I heard you talk about that, the not knowing aspect
from Revee Walsh, and I heard those exact words from
John Walsh years ago when Americas was one and was
still filming. They came into film an episode there at
the National Center and I was on camera. John was
they were just we were just showcasing what we do
(35:41):
there in the forensic imaging and talking about the age progressions.
So I was I was nervous, so I think it
was my first time on Americans. Was wanted sweating profusely,
probably the worst media interview ever. So John was just great,
very very relaxing. So the cameras rolling comes in. Here's
Joe Mullins, one of our forensic image of specialist. Here,
(36:03):
Joe wants you to explain which we do here. So
I'm clicking through the demo talk about h progression and
to get to a picture of a skull. And I say,
here with skulls that we stop bringing home a live
child at least we provide closure for families. John, I
don't think I get the word out of my mouth.
John walls shoes up and yells cut. So he kind
of spun my chair around, had a gray suit, white
(36:26):
shirt and red tie on. He's leaning over and he's
said to Joe, it's like people say that all the time,
you know, the closure. I don't. I don't like that word.
It's like I'm never, never going to forget my son,
he said. A better way to explain the service that
the National Centers providing with these with these images is
you're providing answers to families, he said, because not knowing
(36:48):
as a nightmare, you can't wake up. Oh that was
probably over twenty years ago and make a point to
tell that story and in this realm. I've that was
the last time I ever said close, because he has
every right to. I think that was a perfect explanation
and that was one of the as the top five
(37:09):
moments of my career there at the National Center. At
that moment with John Moss, that was very humbling.
Speaker 1 (37:15):
No, that's pretty good education, right there, no question. And
you know that family, I mean, what they have done
through their tragedy is beyond. But one thing that I
always just knocks me out when I think of, you know,
Ms Walsh when they're doing the story of Adam and
(37:38):
they're going to make this movie and she insists that
current missing children be highlighted at the end. And you know,
that's one of those things. You know, as a mama,
you think she should be so uber focused on her
child and what happened to him and the answers that
(37:59):
they deserve. Yet she's not. She's focused on as many
as she possibly can. So again, you know, you have
aligned yourself with I think some of the most extraordinary
people that are out there because of their capacity to
love and to give and to honor.
Speaker 2 (38:18):
I owe it to Adam and the Walsh family to
do everything I can. So No, every family has answers
and every child is brought home. I feel like that's
my that's my job. That's why I love marking. No.
Speaker 1 (38:39):
You asked if I had ever had the opportunity to
deal with an anthropologist. Well, again, here in Georgia we
have doctor Alice Gooden, and she, hands down, has provided
some of the best training that I've had in the
last forty years. Hands down, I mean she takes us
(39:01):
out in the woods. We're going to excavate, you know,
a body of a hog, and we're going to do
it right, whether it's raining or snowing or in the
case of my class of tornado warning was underway. And
then I had the opportunity to go to the body
Farm and train with doctor Donnie Steadman and Tennessee. Yes, yeah,
(39:26):
And if you ever want to feel like, you know,
academically you are subpar, go spend some time with doctor Stedman.
Good lord, you know, you just leave there just knowing,
you know, her IQ is a little bit higher than yours.
But anyway, phenomenal. But here's one thing that I learned
that I had never thought about prior to that training,
(39:48):
and that training was ten years ago. She talked specifically
about skulls from people that had a mixed ethnic background,
and so she was saying, the skin made tell you
one thing, but the skull is going to tell you another.
And so she used, like Keanu Reeves and halle Berry
and President Obama, that if you only had the skull,
(40:10):
you may not come up with the same outward appearance.
Have you ever run across that where you were not
certain of how to portray the skull.
Speaker 2 (40:22):
Oh yeah, I mean it's even with the best forensic
anthropologies out there, which I feel like I have the
opportunity to work with a lot of them, sometimes they're
I don't think doctor Hunt liked this assessment or explanation.
Just to keep I keep things simple. So forensic anthropology
(40:42):
works with the majority rules. So they've looked at, you know,
a thousand skulls and they found eight hundred and fifty.
This is this is how these features translate into you know,
from a skull feature into the soft tissue of an
actual face and everything from you know, of the ad mixtures.
(41:02):
You know, it's like the stepty black Hispanic or white black,
you know, all the ad mixtures are different variations. But
it doesn't put in a right face on there is
I mean, it's it's certainly not it's not an exact science,
not the downplay there, but it's sometimes you have to
(41:23):
do the best with what the information you have and
go go forward from there and still with that hopes
that you've got some feature right that somebody can see
it and say, you know, hey, that's that kind of
looks like my you know, uncle, I haven't seen him
in ten years, and that's that's really the best that
counts as a success in our book. That's back to that.
(41:45):
The almost is almost as good enough. But when you
start breaking down to the skulls, there's lots of skulls
that have the ancestry, and there's difference between you know, race, ethnicity,
and ancestry. So think of a bag of jelly beans.
So race would be the color of the jelly bean,
(42:07):
Ethnicity would be the flavor of the jelly bean. An
ancestry would be the factory where the jelly beans were made.
So when you're looking at a skull, you're thinking about
it was more ancestry, just the facts. But as we
start putting that face on there, so say it's like
a black Hispanic. Now Hispanic is an ethnicity, not a race,
but that's a term that most people are familiar with.
(42:30):
Makes that switch from ances street can now I say,
we have to get to hit that target that parameters
of the details we have in front of us. So
it has to look like a Hispanic person, or it
has to look or it has to look like a
Caucasian person. It's a balance sometimes like how far do
you take the details or how you have to work
(42:51):
with a restricted artistic license. Basically, you have to let
the skull tell you. If the skull or the anthropologist
isn't in telling you what to do, then you you
can't do it. I can't do it. I can't go
off the rails and put on my artistic hat and
make it look pretty not accurate.
Speaker 1 (43:09):
And that's the deal. We're back to that team. We're
back to those people that you trust to tell you
this is what you have and that's all you can
you know, put into your work.
Speaker 2 (43:18):
There's been cases with you know, the three main ancestor
groups are are black, White, and Asian, and there's been
you know, hundreds of skulls that have had all three
of those characteristics. So what how do you how do
you represent that face? You know, with the ad mixture
you touched on you like COUNTA Reeves, President Obama, Helly Berry.
Those are all great beautiful faces, you know, but that's
(43:43):
that's there's a lot of the ad mixture. So it's stuff.
So for us, we always like checks and Ballet will
do a buddy check or ask our fellow artists to
take a look at it. We'll send it back to
whatever anthropologist or medical exammer we're working with just to
make sure we're put in that right face, the best
face out there, because ultimately, as a forensic artist, we're
(44:04):
the last phone call. They've they've exhausted every other resource
at their disposal and they bring it to us. So
we've got to make we've got to get it right
and put the best face out there and over the
accurate face that helps, that sparks that recognition.
Speaker 1 (44:20):
Yeah, your job is like mine. I'm the last one called,
and I think you know, I tell people all the time,
I'm not a first responder. I'm a last responder, and
I think there's not only a little pressure added sometimes,
but I think there's a great responsibility because we are
the last shot.
Speaker 2 (44:37):
That's why I mean, I'm gonna do my job. I can't.
There's never been a time in twenty five years I've
woken up like I have to go to work today
and that feeling of dread, it's always that thought has
never crossed my mind. That's if I don't do my
job right, that's that family might not ever get the answer,
so that that child might not ever get home. So
(45:02):
I always do my job as to the best of
my abilities and make sure I ever become complacent and
always always a better way to do it. So hopefully
I'm always learning and improving, and I'll keep doing it.
I was joking with somebody recently at work, so have
you been there for twenty five years? I guess it's
(45:25):
like I think I'm probably gonna be one of those
people just die at my desk. That'd be okay with me.
Speaker 1 (45:32):
I would die happy, sure, understood, understood. People ask me
all the time, you're not retired for what I ain't
made to fish all day, Let's go. I want to
get in the middle of it. Unfortunately we have that,
And you know, I tell people all the time, you
know you you need to be so grateful when somebody
(45:54):
says they love what they do, when it's something that
other people just can't. I mean, Joe, we can not
do what you do. I'm never going to be an artist.
I'm never going to be able to draw or pain
or sculpt or any of that. But you know, thank
the good Lord, you not only can do it, but
are willing to use it in this way.
Speaker 2 (46:14):
Very fortunate. My mom always says, you shit early on
in my career. I'm so proud of you, So you
do it. Art art with a purpose, That is what
it is. I can't stress enough how important it is
to take take a moment and look at those pictures.
And we get so busy doing everything else in our
(46:35):
in our lives and get distracted. But that I said
early on, everything we create, it doesn't work unless the
right person sees it. So take a moment to share
those images on social media. We get out as many
people as possible, because if you haven't gone through that's
(46:57):
the trauma or horrible now of not knowing where your
child is. That's it's a horrible thing and we don't
want anybody to go through that just because we haven't
gone through it. I think that's just something that we
need to reassure ourselves and make sure that we don't
(47:19):
ever have to go through that, and make sure do
everything we can to help those that are going through
it by being more proactive looking at those pictures, you know,
picking up the phone, call, if you see something, do something,
you make a difference, get involved. Don't let any you know,
skull sit on a shelf unidentified, or let some little
(47:41):
boy or little girl get abducted and take it away
from their family for five, ten, fifteen years. That's doesn't
have to be that way. I think we can all
pitch in and let's get all the children home and
all the skulls identified. I'm gonna keep doing it until
somebody tells me to sty or my wife fakes me retire.
Speaker 1 (48:02):
Well, Joe Mowens, I cannot thank you enough for being
with us on Zone seven tonight, and I can't thank
you enough for being a part of my Zone seven.
Speaker 2 (48:10):
This has been truly amazing. I've been looking forward to
this for some time now, and anything, anything you need
from me, you just let me know and I'll I'll
get it done.
Speaker 1 (48:21):
Well. I appreciate you, and we're going to add a
link to this episode that goes straight to some of
your work so people can start looking at these faces
and hopefully let's bring somebody home. As Joe has said
multiple times, it just takes one person, the right person
to see the right image and then we have something solid.
Speaker 2 (48:43):
Yeah, that's all it takes. Just be that one person.
Speaker 1 (48:47):
Be that one person. Amen. I'm going to end Zone
seven the way that I always do with a quote.
At first, it was a bit eerie for the students
as they unpacked the skull Replicans. What about four days
into the class, something changed. Students were no longer looking
at a skull, a relatively abstract concept of a human,
(49:10):
but a person. John Volt, director of the New York
Academy of Art. I'm Cheryl McCollum, and this is Zone seven.
Host
Sheryl McCollum
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