*Source: DailyMail * THIRD scandal over how the Army treats its dead
* Bodies at Arlington National Cemetery put in WRONG graves
* Military lost body parts and shipped fetal remains in cardboard boxes
Body parts belonging to U.S. soldiers killed in Iraq and Afghanistan were routinely cremated and then dumped in a landfill site.
For five years, between 2003 and 2008, staff at the Dover Air Force base mortuary, Delaware, disposed of parts that could not be identified or were later recovered from the battlefield.
Family members were not told what happened to their relatives - and the company running the landfill site was not even informed what was being thrown away.
A damning new report reveals the military mishandled the remains of soldiers returning through Dover Air Force Base
It is the third scandal engulfing the Army in its treatment of its dead.
Gari-Lynn Smith, portions of whose husband’s remains were disposed of in the landfill after his 2006 death in Iraq, told the Washington Post she was 'appalled and disgusted' by the way the Air Force had acted.
She said: 'My only peace of mind in losing my husband was that he was taken to Dover and that he was handled with dignity, love, respect and honour.
'That was completely shattered for me when I was told that he was thrown in the trash.'
Lt Gen Darrell G Jones, the Air Force’s deputy chief for personnel, said the body parts were cremated, then incinerated, and then taken to a landfill by a military contractor.
He likened the procedure to the disposal of medical waste. The Dover mortuary changed its policy to burying the parts at sea in June 2008.
Dover's mortuary processed over 4,000 sets of remains from 2008 to 2010, most of which were Iraq and Afghanistan war dead
It is not known how many body parts were disposed of, during the five years, at the King George County site, operated by Waste Management Inc.
The scandal is the latest to hit the military base which receives all America's war dead and prepares them for burial.
Earlier this week it was revealed that body parts belonging to deceased soldiers were lost or sawed off without the family’s permission.
An 18-month probe into Dover's mortuary, pictured here, revealed one soldier had his arm cut off by staff without the family's permission
A damning report found that an arm bone belonging to a dead marine was hacked off without asking his parents by staff at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware.
An ankle and some soft tissue went unaccounted for due to ‘gross mismanagement’ and may have been mixed in with the remains of other soldiers.
Whistleblowers also claimed that the fetal remains of dependents of military personnel were shipped from Germany back to the U.S. in cardboard boxes that had already been used.
Three officials have been disciplined at Dover - but none have lost their jobs.
The scandal at Dover Air Force base began after complaints by three whistleblowers - civilians who worked as embalmers or technicians - who sparked an 18-month investigation by the Air Force Inspector General.
A separate probe was carried out by the Office of Special Counsel, an independent federal investigative agency which looks into claims by whistleblowers.
Among the most egregious instances was when the family of one marine asked to see his dead body one more time - so staff at Dover hacked his arm bone off.
The heat from a bomb attack in Afghanistan had caused the soldier’s arm to fuse at 90 degrees to his body so he was unable to fit into his uniform or his casket.
But instead of speaking to his family to see what was for the best, staff went ahead and trimmed it anyway.
The investigation found the two body parts that went missing were a piece of an ankle belonging to a soldier killed by a bomb in Afghanistan in April 2009.
The investigation found two body parts went missing entirely, including a piece of an ankle belonging to a soldier killed by a bomb in Afghainstan and a small piece of flesh belonging to an airman who died in plane crash in Afghanistan
The second was a small piece of flesh belonging to an airman who died in plane crash in Afghanistan in July 2009.
The investigation did not discover what happened to them - but raised the possibility they fell out of the plastic bags where they were being stored in the morgue refrigerator and got mixed in with the remains of others.
The whistleblowers also drew attention to shipping of fetal remains belonging to relatives of military personnel back to the U.S.
Instead of being transported in the more dignified aluminium cases they were shipped in re-used cardboard boxes.
In a statement accompanying her report Special Counsel Carolyn Lerner said the findings were ‘deeply troubling’.
She said: ‘The mortuary for the United States military should boast the best conditions and best practices of any mortuary.’
The report added that there was a ‘pattern of the Air Force’s failure to acknowledge culpability for wrongdoing relating to the treatment of remains of service members and their dependents.
The Dover scandal comes just months after it was revealed Arlington National Cemetery had 211 graves either mislabelled or containing the wrong person's remains
It said: ‘While the report reflects a willingness to find paperwork violations and errors, with the exception of the cases of missing portions, the findings stop short of accepting accountability for failing to handle remains with the requisite ‘reverence, care and dignity befitting them and the circumstances’’.
Among the other findings was a chilling insight into the chaos at Dover including one incident in July 2009 when the remains of two airmen killed in in Afghanistan were brought in.
One unnamed employee admitted that it was ‘hard to keep track of everything’ and that the medical examiners were ‘messing with the bags a bit’.
He said: ‘And then they would walk to the back, and then they’d come back and - it was - it was a really hectic day.’
Earlier this year a report by the Army Inspector’s Office found that at least 211 graves at Arlington National Cemetery, Virginia, had been incorrectly labelled or had the wrong body in them.
There were also cases of remains being moved without families' consent or graves left empty when they should have remains in them.
The cemetery is considered sacred ground and has been the final resting place of the nation's veterans since 1864.
More than 300,000 servicemen and women are now buried there.
General Norton Schwartz, the chief of staff of the Air Force, apologised for the mistakes made at Dover.
He said: ‘We understand the obligation of this work, the sanctity of this work, the need for reverence, the need for dignity and respect of our fallen, just as if these were our sons and daughters’.
An Army and FBI probe is still investigating the outrage at the nation’s most hallowed military graveyard.
