William R. Belcher

Associate Professor Forensic Anthropology, Department of Anthropology at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.

In August 2005, a military forensic archaeology team traveled to the Joker Mountain area of the Pasayten Wilderness in northern Washington State to excavate a P-38 Lightning aircraft lost in November 1942. The team recovered a series of personal effects and human remains from the aircraft after several weeks of work. These materials were returned to the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command (now the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency) Laboratory on Hickam AFB for analysis and identification. The pilot was identified in March of 2006 and eventually interred in the Indiantown Gap National Cemetery in Pennsylvania.