CORPUS CHRISTI, Tx — After a months-long search, Caleb Harris has been found and identified.
According to a release from Corpus Christi Police Blotter, forensic analysts with the University of North Texas Center for Human Identification (UNTCHI) have determined that the human remains found inside a City Wastewater Lift Station last month is most likely Caleb Harris.
Harris, a 21-year-old Texas A&M - Corpus Christi student, disappeared from his off-campus apartment in the early morning of Monday, March 4, 2024. CCPD organized an exhaustive search of the area around Harris’s apartment complex for weeks following his disappearance, deploying the Drone Team, Bike Team, Enduro Unit, 83rd Police Academy Class, Search and Recovery Dive Team, and Directed Patrol Officers.
The Coast Guard, Texas Parks and Wildlife, Port of Corpus Christi Police Department Marine Unit, Texas Search and Rescue, student volunteers from Texas A&M CC, along with countless additional civilian volunteers, also joined the search effort.
An investigative team, which included CCPD’s Criminal Investigation Division and Organized Crime Unit, the FBI, the United States Marshals Service, and the Texas Rangers was formed within days of Harris’s vanishing. These investigators executed over 50 digital search warrants, submitted 82 preservation requests, and analyzed over 1500 GB of Data for months.
On Monday, June 24, city workers conducting maintenance at the Perry Place wastewater lift station discovered the remains inside a wastewater collection well and immediately contacted the Police Department.
The remains, which had "no obvious signs of homicide," as stated in the Blotter, were transported to the Nueces County Medical Examiner’s Office for examination. Due to the advanced state of decomposition, the ME’s Office was unable to make an identification, or provide cause of death. So they sent the remains were then sent to the UNTCHI for DNA analysis, along with DNA samples from Harris’s parents.
According to the Missing Persons DNA Report issued today by UNTCHI, the remains “are approximately 2.4 sextillion times more likely to be observed if the unidentified remains originated from a biological child of (Caleb Harris’s parents) rather than if the unidentified remains originated from an unrelated individual from the Caucasian population.”
The remains will be returned to the Nueces County Medical Examiner’s office, which will then issue the final autopsy report.
