BUCHA, Ukraine — The corpses, charred and partially dismembered, lay scattered amid a pile of trash in a lot along the edges of a forest. Tattered remnants of clothing clung to shreds of skin. Who was a man, who was a woman, who was an adult, who a child — this was not possible to determine at a glance. A severed leg, badly singed, was situated some distance away.
This tableau was about 100 yards from a playground with swings and slides, nestled beneath a woodsy shade.
A Ukrainian forensic team, each member donning blue plastic gloves, worked with practiced speed. They pushed past a crush of journalists, ducked beneath crime-scene tape and hurriedly gathered the bits and pieces and placed them in black bags. Some mixing of parts seemed inevitable, so intermingled were the cadavers. The workers zipped the bags tight and hoisted them aloft, to be taken to the morgue.
