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NCSO provides update on body found last summer in Niagara River

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Fri, Feb 19th 2021 03:55 pm

From the Niagara County Sheriff’s Office:

At 1:27 p.m., June 27, 2020, the Niagara County Sheriff's Office Communications Center received a call from a citizen reporting a possible body in the lower Niagara River along the coastline of a residence in the area of 3719 Lower River Road, Youngstown. A Niagara County Sheriff's Office marine patrol unit, with the assistance of the U.S. Coast Guard, secured the deceased unknown female and brought her ashore at Coast Guard Station Niagara in Youngstown. Coroner Laura Sweeney-Goodlander secured the body. The Niagara County Sheriff's Criminal Investigative Bureau responded and continued to investigate.

As the investigation continued, it was determined from evidence secured by Investigator Brian Schell that the deceased female was possibly the subject of a missing person investigation being conducted by Niagara Regional Police Service in Ontario, Canada. The missing person was from China. Officers from that agency collected a DNA sample from a family member along with a sample from the remains recovered in the Niagara River. Those samples were submitted into the National Missing Persons DNA Program in Canada.

On Feb. 10, a DNA match was made and the deceased female was positively identified as Jie YU of China. The 25-year-old woman was reported missing to the Niagara Regional Police Service after being observed going over the falls in Niagara Falls, Ontario, on Dec. 10, 2019.

 This investigation was an example of terrific international law enforcement collaboration between two countries that resulted in answers for a grieving family in China.

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