Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of unidentified decedents in the United States


 * 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 delete. ✗ plicit  23:52, 15 September 2021 (UTC)

List of unidentified decedents in the United States

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This is a very small random sampling of unidentified decedents in the United States which is largely sourced to the non-profit website for the The Doe Network. I'm not seeing how this indiscriminate list benefits the encyclopedia or meets the criteria at WP:NLIST. According to the National Missing and Unidentified Persons System, on average approximately 4,400 unidentified bodies are recovered every year in the United States (see here). As such, individual unidentifiable bodies are unlikely to be notable or encyclopedic. For those unidentifiable bodies that do meet GNG in rare cases, such a list is better housed on wikipedia within categories (see Category:Unidentified decedents in the United States and related sub cats) because such lists within article space inevitably attract more non-notable additions than notable ones. Further, many of the names of these unidentifiable bodies are problematic as they are named for counties which often have hundreds if not thousands of John and Jane Does in their cold case files. This list is essentially listcruft as well as having issues with NLIST and WP:OR. 4meter4 (talk) 22:51, 8 September 2021 (UTC)

Adendum I am also adding the following articles which are WP:Content forks of the main list.4meter4 (talk) 23:05, 8 September 2021 (UTC)

See the following:


 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Lists of people-related deletion discussions.  Spiderone (Talk to Spider) 23:42, 8 September 2021 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of United States of America-related deletion discussions.  Spiderone (Talk to Spider) 23:43, 8 September 2021 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Lists of people-related deletion discussions.  Spiderone (Talk to Spider) 23:42, 8 September 2021 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of United States of America-related deletion discussions.  Spiderone (Talk to Spider) 23:43, 8 September 2021 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Lists of people-related deletion discussions.  Spiderone (Talk to Spider) 23:42, 8 September 2021 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of United States of America-related deletion discussions.  Spiderone (Talk to Spider) 23:43, 8 September 2021 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Lists of people-related deletion discussions.  Spiderone (Talk to Spider) 23:42, 8 September 2021 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of United States of America-related deletion discussions.  Spiderone (Talk to Spider) 23:43, 8 September 2021 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Lists of people-related deletion discussions.  Spiderone (Talk to Spider) 23:42, 8 September 2021 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of United States of America-related deletion discussions.  Spiderone (Talk to Spider) 23:43, 8 September 2021 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Lists of people-related deletion discussions.  Spiderone (Talk to Spider) 23:42, 8 September 2021 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of United States of America-related deletion discussions.  Spiderone (Talk to Spider) 23:43, 8 September 2021 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Lists of people-related deletion discussions.  Spiderone (Talk to Spider) 23:42, 8 September 2021 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of United States of America-related deletion discussions.  Spiderone (Talk to Spider) 23:43, 8 September 2021 (UTC)


 * Delete all The NamUs link above indicates that of the 4,400 annual unidentified bodies each year, 1,000 remain so after a year. I would guess many of them are identified after that still, and that number is perhaps lower in recent years with better DNA testing. But with just 140 in this main list, 108 of which are sourced to the Doe Network, it's unclear why these among the thousands are listed. Most are sadly fairly routine descriptions of discovery and personal characteristics, so I don't see why it is encyclopedic to import these non-notable examples from the Doe and NamUs databases in this way. Reywas92Talk 03:39, 9 September 2021 (UTC)
 * Delete all: Agree with making this a category for the notable individuals instead of a series of lists that are not reasonable given the numbers of individuals. FiddleheadLady (talk) 12:37, 9 September 2021 (UTC)
 * Delete all: Per WP:NOTDATABASE.   Ravenswing     01:11, 10 September 2021 (UTC)
 * Keep: I'm the one who added the 50+ cases or so to each page. The idea behind doing so was to help give these cases some exposure to help spread the word about cases that had *some* note to them, compared to "this decedent was found in a desert area near Las Vegas" with no further elaboration while not dedicating an entire page to a case that would not have enough information to create a page of substance. Blame me for why it got so out of control, but this sampler was meant to be a way for people to discover certain cases that had some significance but not enough to dedicate their own page to, as it would lead to a stub page. I've dedicated about a year and a half of spare time to trying to expand out this list, as it was originally the reason I got so interested in the subject matter, but I do see what others are saying about how its written compared to other pages. Doe Network usually sources their material, mainly from the NamUs system, a government database designed to catalogue missing and unidentified persons, however at the time, when I made most of these expansions, Doe Network was a lot more accessible for me to use as a source than the latter. For the more specific ones concerning states, many states have much more cases than others (California has over 2000 compared to New Hampshire's 4), so rather than clog up an already long page, I made the more specific ones to keep the strain on this one lower, as well as keep the number of cases on the main page between each state relatively similar. Aside from varying up sources, what can I and the dozen or so other users that have dedicated their time to these pages do to keep them better kept and at a lower risk of deletion? I'm not very versed in Wikipedia's more internal pages like this one so I'm sorry if the syntax of this deviates from the norm somewhat. Doggybag2355 (talk) 21:05, 10 September 2021 (UTC)
 * In what way do you think the cases you have added fall under wikipedia's notability guidelines? The unidentified decedents you have added are largely sourced to one source, The Doe Network website, and you have assigned arbitrary names to those bodies not based in the source; basically drawing your own unique conclusions and creating what amounts to WP:Original Synthesis. There is a reason why we have policies like WP:No original research and the need to verify content with multiple reliable sources (see WP:Verifiability). Additionally, The Doe Network profiles are essentially copy pasted law enforcement case files with law enforcement/NAMUS case numbers as titles, and are therefore not independent but are considered primary sources. Therefore, these individual unidentifiable decendents lack independent RS which makes them unsuitable for use within wikipedia per WP:PRIMARY (unless they are being used in conjunction with secondary and tertiary sources which isn’t the case in this list). All of this to say, how is this encyclopedic? Wikipedia's purpose and role is not to advocate or draw attention to unidentified decedent cases. It seems like you created these pages as a tool for advocacy outside of wikipedia's purview which is a WP:POV and WP:COI issue as described at Advocacy.4meter4 (talk) 22:02, 10 September 2021 (UTC)
 * Well that's my bad then. I didn't make these pages, at least this one and California, I only expanded on them. I don't need to be berated on why the pages aren't good enough, you've made your point. I thought I was doing a service by expanding on these pages, but apparently not. Doggybag2355 (talk) 00:44, 11 September 2021 (UTC)
 * Please don't take this personally. Your heart was in the right place, and I think you were just not aware of why these kind of contributions are not really appropriate for wikipedia. Now you know. The statements above are necessary conversations pertinent to this AFD that have to be had in order to implement wikipedia policy, and are not meant to berate you personally but address the need to delete inappropriate content. If we allowed advocacy work on wikipedia, our neutrality and reliability as an encyclopedia would be jeopardized, and that is something we have to protect. I hope you will find some other way of contributing to the project that interests you. Please take some time to read through our core policies pages though, so you don't accidentally step into something controversial a second time.4meter4 (talk) 00:56, 11 September 2021 (UTC)
 * You're a moron, wow. 142.67.230.105 (talk) 22:27, 31 December 2023 (UTC)


 * Delete per nom. Yaxı Hökmdarz (talk) 19:46, 15 September 2021 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it.</b> 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.