Forensic Technician Draws Facial Composite Sketch From Skull

The human skull found two miles East of Lake Fulmer in May has yet to be identified, according to the Riverside County Sheriff’s Department.

Investigators sought out the assistance of a forensic artist to develop a composite sketch of the person, hoping someone would recognize the man and determine how the man died.

The sketches were released last month.

Cori Koptizke has been a forensic technician for more than five years and she said it took some 20 hours to reconstruct the man’s face and draw the composite sketch.

Much of the process is approximation, she said. But all of it is based on science.

“Once I get the tissue dent markers on and take photos the rest of it is with photos,” said Koptizke.

Deputies from the Hemet Sheriff’s Station found the skull on May 18.

It was then sent to a forensic anthropologist who determined the skull was a man, possibly Caucasian or Hispanic between the ages of 20 and 40.

“That makes a difference because he wont have the same mongoloid features like an Asian would have,” said Koptizke.

The coroner’s office then handed the skull over to Kopitzke in June.

The drawings were completed in August.

“When the skull gets here, the first thing I do is I take photographs of it exactly as it sits for documentation,” she said.

She then cuts and applies numbered tissue dent markers around the skull.

The dent markers allow her to place tracing paper over the photo and then connect the dots developing the face.

“The photo is accurate,” she said. “It’s extremely accurate. It’s taken on the Frankfort Horizontal Plane so that it is looking at you face on.”

There were no traces of the man’s hair found at the crime scene, so Kopitzke gave him generic hair — nothing trendy.

The skull was at least 5 years old.

Facial hair was not found near the skull either.

“I know where the eyebrows fit on the skull, because it starts right here on the ridge,” she said. “What I don’t know is how think, if he groomed them, how thin, if they go all the way across.”

She gave him generic eyebrows.

Kopitzke used an FBI facial recognition catalog to determine the shape and size of the nose.

“I look at what the skull has to tell me, and the nasal opening will give me an approximation for what the shape of the nose should look like,” she said.

In this case, she said the man had a very large nose.

She gave him average ears because she didn’t know what they looked like.

“But I know where they belong,” she said. “I just put something in so he would have ears.”

This is the fifth facial reconstruction Kopitzke has ever drawn for the sheriff’s department.

“I have one that has been matched up, but it was not released,” she said.

Some of the man’s teeth were found with the skull.

The hope is that someone will recognize the face and allow authorities to match his dentals and identify him.

“Then somebody else can call us an say this looks like John Doe. This is where he used to live and they can start doing research,” she said. “He used to go to this dentist. Well, then now they have actual dental records that they can compare the skull.”

Authorities are still treating this case as a homicide.

Anyone with any information that could help solve this crime is urged to call the Riverside County Sheriff’s Department.