Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of formerly unidentified decedents


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was keep. (non-admin closure)  Arun Kumar SINGH (Talk)  04:47, 14 July 2016 (UTC)

List of formerly unidentified decedents

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I know that this is a listification attempt going along with this CFD but is this really an appropriate stand-alone list? I don't see the required selection criteria under WP:CSC here. Literally every police department has a morgue full of people who were "formerly unidentified" and then later identified so this list would literally be in the millions. It seems to be a list of notable formerly unidentified decedents but only if the person isn't immediately identified I imagine. As noted in the CFD discussion, technically Richard III of England falls under a 1485 death and 2013 identification here which tells you this list is problematic. Ricky81682 (talk) 19:11, 6 July 2016 (UTC)
 * Author Pedantically every death is unidentified until that body is formally identified. The list is intended for those bodies which take a significant time to be identified. I find the topic interesting (which is not the same as notable) and consider the list to be useful. Richard III of England is a red herring. When he died he was not unidentified and is therefore outside the scope of this list. His body was lost and belongs in a different list (if there is one). Twiceuponatime (talk) 09:24, 7 July 2016 (UTC)
 * So it's only when the person is identified and determined to not be notable that it matters? If a notable person died, then their identification is irrelevant? It feels very much like it's going to be personal opinion as to what falls as I presume notable identifications as opposed to a notable person being identified rather than some neutral standard. If the body was identified in 2013 but not Richard III but from the 1800s or from the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier for the Revolutionary War, does that merit inclusion or not? -- Ricky81682 (talk) 23:35, 7 July 2016 (UTC)
 * Comment I wonder if renaming the article might make the intended scope clearer. RevelationDirect (talk) 09:53, 9 July 2016 (UTC)
 * Keep It needs expansion, of course, but it won't be too difficult. As long as it's reserved for more notable cases and for those that remained long-term unidentified decedents or those that garnered a reasonable amount of publicity while unidentified (i.e. Riley Sawyers).--  Gourami Watcher Talk 19:48, 7 July 2016 (UTC)
 * Weak Keep - I don't think expansion is necessarily what this needs. What it needs is a clearer inclusion criteria, and it seems like it would be possible to do so such that (a) the entries are themselves notable, and (b) it's limited to those people for which the identification of their bodies received some amount of coverage. Right now there's an embedded list at Unidentified decedent. This article shows it could be expanded to such an extent that spinning it out would make sense anyway. &mdash;  Rhododendrites talk  \\ 01:38, 8 July 2016 (UTC)
 * Weak Keep Potentially a useful list and a notable subject, but I notice there are no sources. Dimadick (talk) 21:41, 8 July 2016 (UTC)
 * Comment. For this to be kept, we need to show that it passes WP:LISTN. Are all such unidentified bodies discussed as a set? I would actually buy likely notability for all unidentified bodies within a city, since regional or even national media are likely to discuss past unidentified bodies in articles discussing a recently identified one. But do any publications actually discuss all unidentified bodies everywhere as a set? I'm leaning delete unless someone can demonstrate such coverage. ~ Rob 13 Talk 17:12, 10 July 2016 (UTC)
 * We need an easy way for people to find UID's that have an article on the en-wikipedia without a cumbersome search. Paul Benjamin Austin (talk) 18:11, 10 July 2016 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.