Husson Criminal Justice Student Interned at the Chief Medical Examiner’s Office

Published on: November 13, 2026

When Husson University student Ashley Harmon first began calling the families of missing people in Maine at her summer internship, she was expecting that they wouldn’t want to speak to her. But then she started being thanked for the calls.

Many families, she learned, were happy to know that their loved one hadn’t been forgotten.

The phone calls were part of the work Harmon, a criminal justice student, did as an intern with the Maine Office of the Chief Medical Examiner. She was charged with going through missing persons files and contacting the families to try to obtain DNA samples. 

The medical examiner’s office has more than 30 sets of unidentified remains. Harmon’s work obtaining DNA samples from the families of more than 20 missing persons is part of an effort to identify the remains and bring closer to the cases — and the families.

“I had quite a few people say thank you,” she said about speaking with families. “To have someone actually care about their loved one, to be talking about this, you don’t know what it means to them.”

Harmon was also tasked with reaching out to dozens of families and law enforcement agencies for files that have DNA samples already but needed a permission form signed for the crime lab to work with the samples. 

The internship gave Harmon so many unique experiences. She participated in daily morning meetings where the department reviews all cases currently being working on together as well as observed autopsies. 

Program director Jay Pelletier, Harmon’s academic advisor, said it was a “no-brainer” recommending Harmon for the position. He said her maturity level, her background and left a positive impression on those she worked with.

“About two weeks in, I received an email from Harley Brann, who works at the medical examiner’s office, and she was just glowing about Ashley.” Pelletier said. “I think because of that, because of the reputation Husson has, but also Ashley as an individual, it opened the door for other students who are now looking for similar opportunities.”

Harmon was the first intern from Husson at the Chief Medical Examiner's Office, she is not the last. A second student is interning there this fall.

For Harmon, the internship provided new experience but also led to her becoming a certified death investigator. She’s continuing to work with the medical examiner’s office as a field investigator, a contractor position.

—Noel Hudson