NEW ORLEANS — The St. Tammany Parish Coroner’s Office and the DNA Doe Project announced that they have positively identified the victim of a 2016 homicide investigation.
Officials identified the man as Kleanthis Konstantinidis.
“I applaud our investigators who worked this very complicated case and sought out available resources and technology to identify the victim,” Sheriff Randy Smith said. “I am thankful for the cooperation between our detectives, the St. Tammany Coroner’s Office DNA Lab, the LSU FACES Lab, the DNA Doe Project, Parabon NanoLabs and the Biloxi Police Department. They all played a role in identifying our victim and locating his next of kin.”
In July of 2016, St. Tammany Sheriff's Office discovered the dead body on Highway 90 near the Rigolets. The body was badly decomposed and the person appeared to have been deceased for several days. The victim's arms were dismembered, and one leg above the knee was also dismembered, according to the Sheriff's Office.
The coroner determined that the body was that of a male, approximately 5-feet-10, with a scar on his chest from prior open heart surgery.
In April 2019, the Biloxi Police Department found a human foot in a bucket during an investigation in Mississippi that had the same DNA as the body found in St. Tammany Parish in 2016.
Biloxi detectives connected with St. Tammany detectives and they were able to identify a relative living in the northern United States for a DNA sample to help identify the victim.
► Get breaking news from your neighborhood delivered directly to you by downloading the new FREE WWL-TV News app now in the IOS App Store or Google Play.