{"id":60607,"date":"2026-07-29T03:56:26","date_gmt":"2026-07-29T03:56:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/60607\/"},"modified":"2026-07-29T03:56:26","modified_gmt":"2026-07-29T03:56:26","slug":"police-hope-dna-will-help-crack-echo-point-man-cold-case-in-blue-mountains","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/60607\/","title":{"rendered":"Police hope DNA will help crack ‘Echo Point Man’ cold case in Blue Mountains"},"content":{"rendered":"

Police hope fresh DNA evidence will help investigators crack a more than two-decades-old cold case in the NSW Blue Mountains.<\/p>\n

On June 4, 2004, the body of a man was found in bushland at Echo Point in Katoomba.<\/p>\n

Despite extensive inquiries over the past 22 years, police have never been able to identify him.<\/p>\n

\"Side<\/p>\n

The man’s body was found in 2004 in Katoomba. (Supplied: Skull Forensics via NSW Police)<\/p>\n

Advanced DNA analysis has now revealed so-called Echo Point Man likely had Latvian ancestry.<\/p>\n

Police also now say he was more than 60 years old.<\/p>\n

At the time he was found, Echo Point Man had been wearing a blue button-up shirt, a red cardigan, a cream jacket, blue corduroy pants, a black belt, and brown work boots.<\/p>\n

Previously released images of a 3D facial reconstruction indicated he was likely Caucasian, with light grey hair and frontal baldness.<\/p>\n

\"Black<\/p>\n

This backpack was found on the man, police say.\u00a0 (Supplied: NSW Police\u00a0)<\/p>\n

He was about 178cm tall and of medium build.<\/p>\n

A note linked to the man also led detectives to believe he had been suffering significant eyesight problems at the time of his death.<\/p>\n

Despite earlier appeals, no-one has ever come forward to say they recognised him.<\/p>\n

\"Lined<\/p>\n

A note linked to the man said the author was “unable to work any longer” due to poor eyesight.\u00a0 (Supplied: NSW Police)<\/p>\n

Blue Mountains Police Area Command Superintendent John Nelson said they hope releasing the new information on Echo Point Man’s ancestry will help provide his team with leads.<\/p>\n

“We are now appealing to anyone with information about a man missing since early 2000s, possibly with Latvian or Middle European heritage, to contact police,” he said in a statement.<\/p>\n

Latvian community asked to help ‘solve puzzle’<\/p>\n

Superintendent Nelson told 2GB police were also calling on members of Australia’s Latvian community to provide DNA samples, in the hopes it would help detectives “solve the puzzle”.<\/p>\n

“He may have migrated anywhere from the 1950s right through to the early 2000s … maybe he’s been a friend that somebody lost touch with during that period, or a long-lost uncle or a brother,” he said.<\/p>\n

\"Composite<\/p>\n

A pair of scissors (right) were retrieved from the backpack. (Supplied: Skull Forensics via NSW Police)<\/p>\n

Superintendent Nelson said a coronial inquest into his death delivered an “open finding”.<\/p>\n

He said some personal toiletries were found with his body, which suggested he might have been between homes or sleeping rough when he died.<\/p>\n

Police do not suspect foul play.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Police hope fresh DNA evidence will help investigators crack a more than two-decades-old cold case in the NSW…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":60608,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[22,21,3062,13500,10484,10485,596,2021,1047],"class_list":["post-60607","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-au","tag-austrlia","tag-blue-mountains","tag-cold-case","tag-dna","tag-evidence","tag-nsw","tag-nsw-police","tag-police"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60607","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=60607"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60607\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/60608"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=60607"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=60607"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=60607"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}