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The headless remains of the infamous Australian outlaw Ned Kelly have finally been identified, officials said on Thursday, solving a mystery dating back more than 130 years.

Considered by some to be a cold-blooded killer, Kelly was also seen as a folk hero and symbol of Irish-Australian defiance against the British authorities.

After murdering three policemen, he was captured in Victoria state in 1880 and hanged at Old Melbourne Gaol in November of the same year. But his body went missing after it was thrown into a mass grave.

The bodies in the grave were transferred from the jail to Pentridge Prison in 1929 and then exhumed again in 2009. The investigation into Kelly began when a skull believed to be his - and stolen in 1978 - was rediscovered.

Doctors and scientists at the Victorian Institute of Forensic Medicine identified his body, found in a wooden axe box, after a DNA sample was taken from Melbourne teacher Leigh Olver, Kelly's sister Ellen's great-grandson.

However, tests found that the skull believed to be Kelly's was in fact not his.

Believed to have been born in 1854 or 1855, Kelly became an outlaw two years before he was hanged, taking on corrupt police and greedy land barons.

He survived a shootout with police in 1878 that saw him, his brother Dan, and friends Joe Byrne and Steve Hart slapped with an 8,000-pound bounty - the largest reward ever offered in the British Empire - for anyone who found them, dead or alive.

Over the next 18 months, the Kelly Gang held up country towns and robbed their banks, becoming folk heroes to the masses.

In a final gunbattle at Glenrowan, three of the gang members died and Kelly, dressed in homemade plate metal armor and helmet, was wounded and arrested.

Photos of his skeletal remains clearly show a bullet hole in one of his leg bones.

Olver, who supplied the DNA, said he was relieved to finally have some closure.

Victoria Police, meanwhile, issued a statement saying that while Kelly's life was "one of Australia's most iconic cultural stories", people should remember he "murdered three police officers in the course of their duty".

The exploits of Kelly and his gang have been the subject of numerous films and television series.

（中國日?qǐng)?bào)網(wǎng)英語點(diǎn)津 Helen 編輯）

About the broadcaster:

Lee Hannon is Chief Editor at China Daily with 15-years experience in print and broadcast journalism. Born in England, Lee has traveled extensively around the world as a journalist including four years as a senior editor in Los Angeles. He now lives in Beijing and is happy to move to China and join the China Daily team.