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Gutiérrez Ayala, who worked in collaboration 
with forensic anthropologist Vincent Sava, called 
the project a “once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.” 
When he asked for student volunteers to help 
with the project, Rosales and Casarrubias  
immediately stepped up to volunteer their 
time. Both major in forensic science.  
“I thought it was interesting. Something  
different than we usually learn in class,” said 
Rosales, 22, of Texas.  
Casarrubias, 27, of Los Angeles, said she 
jumped at the chance to get “hands-on experience 
in the field.” 
Describing the process, Gutiérrez Ayala said 
it started with a visual inspection of the soil, which 
was then sifted through screens that gradually 
got finer and finer to catch any remains or  
historical artifacts. The team identified each 
item by carefully examining it under a micro­
scope and classifying it. The size of each relic is 
still being determined, according to Gutiérrez 
Ayala, but some are about 1 cm, he said.  
“It took a lot of patience taking the bones out 
because some were as small as a grain of rice,” 
said Casarrubias, explaining that extracting the 
relics involved precise movements using a long 
toothpick-like tool, slightly wetted at the tip, to 
hold the delicate artifact piece.  
“As I was doing it, you were eventually able 
to learn what is bone and what is not, because it 
was also mixed with shell and rock,” she said. 
Gutiérrez Ayala and the students found all 
three classes of relics of Saint Marianne. A first-
class relic is human remains; a second-class relic 
could be a piece of her clothing or part of her 
coffin; and the soil itself is a third-class relic as 
it was in contact with a first or second-class relic 
of the saint, Gutierrez explained.  
Rosales called finding the relics “pretty  
rewarding. It was difficult at first since it 
From left, Diocese of Hawai'i 
Bishop Larry Silva, Chami­
nade University of Honolulu 
President Lynn Babington, 
and director of Chaminade’s 
Forensic Sciences Depart­
ment Carlos Gutiérrez Ayala 
discuss the forensic analysis 
in the search for relics of 
Saint Marianne Cope.
PHOTOS COURTESY OF CHAMINADE UNIVERSITY OF HONOLULU

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