Most recently, he said, a murder victim from Cleveland County, in the central part of the state, was found dumped near the parkway. In a 2001 case, the body of a Wisconsin man was discovered by hunters in a forest about seven miles from the Western Carolina campus. The man's son, a former student at Western Carolina, was eventually convicted of killing his father in the summer of 1998.
"Any education program that can be utilized as a resource by local, state and federal law enforcement agencies has got to be a good thing," Schwein said.
Already, Williams has fielded dozens of calls from law enforcement officials excited about the research site, including a trainer who teaches search dogs for nearby Macon County and has put in a plug for training cadaver-finding bloodhounds at the site.
Western Carolina Chancellor John Bardo, who hired Williams from the University of North Dakota in 2003, has been supportive of Williams' effort to build a Top 10 forensic anthropology program at the school.
More than anything, Williams said, the new Western Carolina facility will help students learn whether they literally have the stomach for a field that many choose based on having watched the popular "CSI" television shows.
"'CSI' paints this picture of this sterile, perfect world, where there are no, for example, smells, and even the sights TV flattens out," Williams said. "One of the first thing I want our students to be exposed to is the real thing, so that they don't spend a portion of their life learning this and then go on their first case and ... realize, 'I can't handle this.'"
