John/Jane Doe?

Question

I'm a court show fanatic, I'm wondering... When they find an unidentified body they say john/ jane doe and then a #. But Ive only heard very low numbers on all of the shows I watch, when they find out their identity, do they remove them from the list and re-use the number? How could this possibly be organized?

Answer 1

That's a "tv" designation. Every city/county I've ever heard of assigns an unidentified body a case number that is unique.

They might be referred to informally around the morgue or unit as John or Jane Doe #1 or 2 or whatever but that is just recycled as they are identified.

Answer 2

Usually, there are only one or two unidentified bodies at any one location.  So, an easy designation is jd1 and jd2.