The White County Sheriff’s Office launched an investigation after an inmate tip led deputies to a bucket containing skeletal remains on a property above Wildcat Falls.
White County Sheriff Steve Page said the discovery occurred after an inmate reported seeing the bones at the location several months ago.
“We went to the location he told us they were at and we found the remains that were there,” Page said. “It’s in an area by a bluff where we assume that people go and hunt for arrowheads. We just get up there and locate where he said they were at. They were sitting right there in a bucket.”
Page said state law requires the notification of the state archaeologist to determine the appropriate next steps for the recovery. The Tennessee Division of Archaeology is currently working with local officials to determine if the remains are Native American or if they belong to a missing person.
Page said investigators are unsure of the origin of the bones or how they arrived at the site. The advanced state of the remains makes it difficult to determine the gender or cause of death without further forensic analysis.
“If they’re Native American bones or bones that somehow wound up there and had been in the area for a long time that someone just found and didn’t report, and picked them up and put them in a bucket,” Page said. “And that’s kind of what it appears to be but we won’t know until they tell us what to do from there.”
Page said dental records and DNA will be critical factors in narrowing down a potential identity if the bones are not archaeological in nature. Detectives plan to cross-reference local missing persons reports from across the Upper Cumberland region.
“If they appear to be just human remains and we can rule out that they’re not Native American bones, we will try our best to figure out who they belong to and where they came from,” Page said.
Page said there is no immediate safety threat to the public and the scene is no longer taped off. Investigators do not believe a murder or death occurred at the specific location where the bucket was found.
“Figuring out where they were collected from will be a task in itself,” Page said. “But we’ll see. We’ll see what the bones tell us.”
Community members with information regarding related activity in the area are encouraged to contact the White County Justice Center.
