ORANGEBURG, S.C. — The coroner in Orangeburg has confirmed that remains found in Holly Hill on January 4 are of a woman who'd been reported missing last summer.
Coroner Samuetta Marshall said Tuesday that her office identified the remains as being those of 49-year-old Melissa Aguilar, the Holly Hill resident who was last seen by her family back in August.
"We notified the family because that's our first obligation, and we reached out to the Orangeburg County Sheriff’s Office and we tried to notify them as well,” says Marshall.
The coroner's office says they have not yet determined how long her body was on Fourwind Road in Orangeburg County or what the cause of death was but they're currently working with a forensics expert in Columbia. The remains were found in an area of 30 to 40 feet in a wooded area off Fourwind Road.
"As we collected what we collected and had the anthropologist involved as we moved forward with him, with the assembling of the remains that let us know what we were still looking for so we could adequately find them, and he came out with us a time or two to help us look for those missing pieces," she adds.
Marshall says they notified the family Tuesday afternoon after confirming dental records.
The sheriff's department says Aguilar was found not far from her home and the investigation continues into the cause of her death.