Human Remains Found Near WTC Site
Construction workers cleaning toxic waste from a vacant skyscraper across from the World Trade Center site have found four more human body parts in the building, after finding 10 bone fragments on the rooftop last fall, officials said Tuesday.

The city medical examiner's office will once again extract DNA from the remains recovered from the former Deutsche Bank building and try to match it against a database of the 2,749 people killed at the trade center on Sept. 11, 2001, said Ellen Borakove, spokeswoman for the city medical examiner's office.

Fire Department officials searched the building for remains before, but more are being discovered because the building is being cleaned so thoroughly as construction workers prepare to dismantle it, said John Gallagher, spokesman for the Lower Manhattan Development Corp.

But some victims' family members said forensic experts should search the 41-story building again to perhaps find the remains of loved ones killed more than four years ago.

``I'm not trying to malign the construction workers, but this is not what they're trained to do,'' said Diane Horning, whose son was killed at the trade center and has filed suit to remove trade center debris from a Staten Island landfill where victims' remains were found.

``I just don't understand how they would think this is the right way to go,'' she said.

More than 40 percent of the victims at the trade center have not been identified. The medical examiner's office is storing more than 9,000 unidentified remains and hope that more sophisticated DNA technology can allow for identifications in the future.

Borakove said that two human remains were found on Jan. 27 on the 38th floor of the Deutsche Bank building. She could not say what the remains were or how big they were. Last Friday, workers found two bone fragments on the building's rooftop, she said.

``They are definitely human,'' Borakove said.

Last September, construction workers clearing gravel found 10 human bone fragments on the building's roof, she said.

Gallagher said the LMDC, which owns the building, instructs all its workers to follow a protocol and turn over any remains or other sensitive materials, ``to make certain that anything found at the building will be treated with dignity and respect.''

He said city officials have inspected the entire building before for remains, and said the state rebuilding agency would not have a problem with additional inspections.

Fire Department spokesman David Billig referred all questions on more intensive searches for remains to the medical examiner's office. Borakove said the office was never involved in the search for remains at ground zero and couldn't comment.

The Deutsche Bank building has been vacant since the terrorist attacks, when part of the south tower tore a gash into the building. Deconstruction of the building, which is contaminated with asbestos, lead and trade center dust, began last September. Gallagher said workers will begin taking down the building floor by floor in mid-May.