(WWJ) Authorities in Tennessee say human remains found there five years ago belong to a man originally from Livonia, Michigan.
According to the Knox County Regional Forensic Center (RFC), Knoxville police found a badly decomposed body in a wooded area in May of 2020, and sent the remains to a forensic pathologist who was unable to ID the man or a cause of death.
Officials say "all conventional means of forensic identification" failed to lead investigators to the man’s identity, and multiple missing persons reports were compared for potential matches over the next five years.
Three years later, the remains were sent to a private DNA testing lab in Texas.
Earlier this month, scientists from that lab determined that the man may have had relatives in Michigan.
Ultimately, family members provided DNA samples and results of the testing identified him as Gerald Forsman, who was born in 1958.
It's not known how long Forsman had been dead when his remains were discovered, but one family member told in investigators they hadn't seen Forsman in 22 years.
His cause of death is still unknown.