Human remains found in Perry County, investigation underway

Two fishermen discover human remains near the Ohio River in Cannelton, and the Perry County Coroner’s Office and Indiana State Police are investigating the scene. Officials say the recovery includes a skull, a lower jaw and a femur among the bones found in Perry County.

The remains are sent to an anthropologist to help determine whether they belong to a man or a woman. Authorities have not released the person’s identity, the condition of the remains or how long they were at the site.

For Perry County, a discovery tied to the Ohio River corridor carries immediate weight in places like Cannelton and Tell City, where river access, wooded ground and rural property can all become part of a search area. Residents in Troy, Derby and Bristow also watch these cases closely because a single recovery can widen quickly into a countywide identification effort.

The investigation now turns on forensic work, scene documentation and the chain of evidence collected at the site. That process can take time, especially when only partial remains are recovered and investigators need to match physical findings with missing-person reports or older case files.

Similar remains cases in the region have later been resolved through identification and further lab work, including a separate Indiana investigation in Spencer County that moved from a body discovery in a river to a later cause-of-death release. Perry County authorities have not yet said whether the Cannelton remains connect to any local missing-person report or another case in the region.

For now, the case stays in the hands of the coroner and Indiana State Police as they work to identify the person and determine what happened near the Ohio River.