| Arpad Vass | |
| Birth Name: | Arpad Alexander Vass |
| Birth Date: | 30 August 1959 |
| Nationality: | American |
| Fields: | Forensic anthropology |
| Alma Mater: | BS |
| Doctoral Advisor: | William M. Bass |
| Spouse: | Victoria Ann Longo |
Arpad Alexander Vass (born August 30, 1959) is a forensic anthropologist. He has researched the processes involved in human decomposition. Vass claims to have developed several devices and methods to locate human remains; however, those claims have not been validated by other experts.
Vass is the son of a Hungarian immigrant. He grew up in Arlington, Virginia, where he graduated from Yorktown High School in 1977. He is married to Victoria Ann Longo.
He formerly taught at the Law Enforcement Innovation Center, which is part of the University of Tennessee's Institute for Public Service. For 23 years, he worked as a research scientist within the Life Sciences Division of the Oak Ridge National Laboratory until September 2012. Subsequently, he has been a part-time instructor at the National Forensic Academy in Oak Ridge, Tennessee and has offered various services in missing person cases.
In 1980, Arpad Vass obtained the Antarctic Exploration certification from Scripps Institution of Oceanography. The following year, he earned a Bachelor of Science degree in biology from Virginia Tech. In 1984, Vass earned a Medical Technology degree from Fairfax Hospital. He earned a Masters of Science degree in 1989 from the Virginia Commonwealth University in Administration of Justice (Forensic Science). In 1991, he earned his PhD from the University of Tennessee in anthropology after defending his dissertation titled Time Since Death Determinations of Human Cadavers.
In his work at the University of Tennessee Anthropological Research Facility (ARF), Arpad Vass researched the processes involved in the decomposition of human remains. He isolated specific tissues of the human body and the species of bacteria that affect their decomposition. He was particularly interested in using the chemicals released by a cadaver to determine the time since death and how the detection of those chemicals could assist in locating remains.
Vass's research centered on a forensic science technique called decomposition odor analysis, or DOA. Using air samples collected around cadavers at the ARF, he was able to identify "chemicals containing 424 specific compounds associated with burial decomposition." A database of such vapors could enable the forensic investigators to detect the location of remains of human beings. The database is located at the ARF. However, based on his research, Vass and colleagues concluded that the prevalence of these chemicals is highly variable dependent on environmental conditions of the burial site and the health of the individual prior to death. They were also unable to determine the exact origin of the compounds in the decomposition process.
In an effort to be able to detect chemicals released during composition better and more efficiently than a cadaver dog could, Arpad Vass invented the "Light-Weight Analyzer for Buried Remains and Decomposition Odor Recognition" (LABRADOR). In his 2012 TED Talk, he claims that the device has been used to identify over 100 hidden graves and can identify the stage of decomposition, as well differentiate whether the remains belonged to a human or another type of animal. In the 2010 report for the U.S. Department of Justice., Vass states that LABRADOR's ability to identify non-human remains was only studied in a limited capacity on pig carcasses. Furthermore, in the same report, he qualifies that the device is not yet as sensitive as a dog's nose and can only be used for shallow graves in temperate environments.
Vass holds three patents for LABRADOR. In 2010, the estimated cost of the device was $1,000-$1,500; however, as of March 2022, the device has not been sold commercially.
In 2011, Arpad Vass was a key expert witness for the prosecution in the trial of Casey Anthony, who was accused of murdering her daughter Caylee. Vass's testimony centered on his analysis of air samples taken from Anthony's car as evidence that the child's remains had been placed into the vehicle. The defense had requested in pretrial that the air sample tests be excluded from the evidence presented; however, the judge permitted the tests to be presented in court. Prior to the Anthony case, no other trial in the U.S. had aver allowed such tests to be admitted.
Vass's testimony was disputed in court by an analytical chemist who testified that air sample analysis lacked scientific evidence and that the detected compounds could have been caused by food waste in the car. Vass, himself, admitted shortcomings in his methodology. Legal and forensic experts criticized allowing a technique that lacked "established scientific validity" and that was proprietary to the witness to be presented in court. Vass believes that his role in the trial and the criticism he received for it may have lead Oak Ridge National Laboratory to terminate his employment.
Arpad Vass claims, without scientific evidence, that he has developed several tools to help detect and uncover forensic cases. Experts in forensic anthropology have expressed concerns that the services Vass offers are "very misleading to families and law enforcement" and that since he is not a member of professional organizations in the field, he is not being held to "ethical and scientific standards."
Vass has claimed that dowsing rods can be used to find corpses. This may have started as a practical joke, when Vass coincidently located a corpse on the Body Farm in Tennessee while holding two pieces of wire like divining rods. Since then, Vass has gone on to claim that "dowsing is based on scientific principles and the fact that it was admitted in court is proof of the technique’s credibility." He suggests that buried "bones under mechanical stress" emit a piezoelectric charge which causes the rods to cross when held over a burial site. Vass claims that not everyone can successfully locate a skeleton with dowsing rods because the operator must "have the right voltage, [or] it’s not going to work.”He also admits that the rods could give the same response to a small rodent's bones or to underground power lines as to human remains.
As of 2022, there has not been any peer-reviewed study published that corroborates that any piezoelectric sensor can detect interred bones. A joint study conducted by the U.S. Army Criminal Investigation Command, the FBI Laboratory, and George Mason University, published in 2021, asked participants to use dowsing rods to attempt to identify which 3 out of 9 areas contained buried bones. The results were not signifcantly different from control subjects who visually inspected the burial sites. Scientists posit the ideomotor effect as a rational explanation for the movement of the divining rods.
Vass filed five patents related to a device he now calls the Quantum Oscillator, but had given the name INQUISITOR during the research and development phase. As he explains it, this handheld device is supposed to point in the direction of any distant object (up to 75 miles away) by using the vibrational frequency of a similar material. He claims that this technology can located a missing person, dead or alive, by using DNA from a family member's fingernail. He has not made the device publicly available, citing national security concerns. When requesting Vass to implement his Quantum Oscillator, he "allow[s] only essential personnel to be present" citing the propriatary nature of his equipment and wanting to "guarded company secrets."
Experts have investigated the success rate of the Quantum Oscillator/INQUISITOR. Andrea Lankford, "a former search and rescue park ranger", could not find any case, out of 27 on which Arpad Vass worked where the device successfully "detected an actual missing person or their remains." She consulted Dr. Monte Miller, who holds a PhD in biochemistry and has over 20 years of experience in forensics and DNA analysis, to investigate the claims Vass has made about Vass's device. Miller concluded that "the INQUISITOR is a hoax" and that there is "no research, proofs, or any substantial reason to believe" that it "can actually perform the abilities claimed.
Citing flies' natural inclination to seek out "a corpse within minutes of death," Vass has put forth a proposal to locate human remains with the use of such insects equipped with a tracking chip. However, he admits losing most of his trackers due to birds consuming the insects.