Public Employee Press

2001-2011
"I'm passionate about this project"

Criminalist 1 Sarah McGarvey has devoted her career to helping the families of the victims of the 9/11 attack move beyond the dark chapter in their lives when they lost their loved ones.

A member of the World Trade Center Victim Identification Unit at the Office of Chief Medical Examiner, McGarvey extracts DNA samples from bone bits found at Ground Zero so anthropologists can try to match them with material found at the site or provided by families.

"I am very passionate about this project," said McGarvey, who has a bachelor's degree in molecular genetics and studied forensic science in graduate school. She works with two Criminalist Level 3s, Michael Mosco and Niyrai Bradshaw, who analyze and review data from the DNA. All three are members of Civil Service Technical Guild Local 375.

Three years ago, McGarvey and a team at the Forensic Biology office, which houses the identification unit, came up with a new procedure for extracting DNA.

She cleans bits of bone pieces, grinds them into powder, incubates them and studies the material in a computerized genetic analyzer machine. The DNA information is electronically compared with DNA samples from missing victims' toothbrushes, hairbrushes and clothes as well as other bits of bone.

The samples sometimes match DNA gathered years earlier.

Even 10 years after 9/11, the unit receives about 100 samples a week for testing. They have helped identify 60 percent of the nearly 3,000 victims of the attack.

"We have put a huge effort into identifying the victims," said McGarvey, noting that the OCME has beefed up the staff so all the bone DNA work is done in-house.

—GNH