Joyce Chiang

Body That of INS Lawyer

The body found two weeks ago in the Potomac River is that of missing INS attorney Joyce Chiang, authorities confirmed last week after conducting DNA tests on the remains.

Chiang disappeared Jan. 9 after being dropped off near a coffee shop in Washington, D.C., and family and friends had held vigils since.

“I thought I’d given up the hope,” said Ruth Tintary, a close friend of Chiang’s. “I didn’t realize how much hope I had in my heart, until they told me they had positive ID. I still had hope, and it came crashing down at that point.”

Still, “there is relief that we have Joyce back; we know what has happened to her,” Tintary said. “We’re not left in a nightmare limbo not knowing where she is, how she is. In that sense a part of the nightmare is over.”

Officials would not speculate on the cause of death pending an autopsy, and Tintary said, “There is also the frustration of not knowing how she died, who killed her... then also having to deal and come to terms with the fact that we may never know the answers to those questions.”

There were no apparent wounds or bruises on the body, officials said, However, the corpse, found eight miles from where the lawyer’s keys, jacket and ID were discovered, was badly decomposed.

The FBI continues to pursue leads. “We haven’t ruled anything out. we are investigating all possibilities,” said FBI spokeswoman Elisa Foster.

Tintary said she wanted people “to remember remember Joyce as the epitome of her name, she was a joyful person, that brought a lot of joy in to people’s lives, that she was brilliant and loving and caring and that she just had an ability to not to take herself too seriously.”

Chiang was president of the student body at Smith College and a member of the Board of Trustees of Georgetown Law School. She had begun working for the Immigration and Naturalization Service after law school.

INS Commissioner Doris Meissner said she had “pledged INS’s continued full support and cooperation” in the investigation. “We are saddened and sorrowful that she will no longer be with us,” she said in a statement.

Among Chiang’s survivors are her brothers, Roger Chiang and California Board of Equalization member John Chiang, who said two months ago that he regarded her as his “soulmate.”

Chiang’s funeral has already taken place, but memorials are scheduled in Washington, D.C., and Southern California.