Remains of Australia's most infamous criminal ID'd

SYDNEY�? The headless remains of Australia's most infamous criminal, Ned Kelly, have been identified.

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Victoria state Attorney General Robert Clark said Thursday that a team of forensic scientists identified Kelly's remains among those exhumed from a mass grave at Pentridge prison in Melbourne in 2009.

Kelly led a gang of bank robbers in Victoria in the 19th century. Today, he is considered by many Australians to be a Robin Hood-like figure who stood up to the British colonial authorities of the time.

He was executed in 1880, but his final resting place had long been a mystery.

The Sydney Morning Herald reported that investigators revealed that an almost complete skeleton of the outlaw was found buried in a wooden ax box.

Clark said DNA analysis and other tests were used to confirm the skeleton is Kelly's. The Morning Herald said DNA samples were taken from Melbourne school teacher Leigh Olver, who is the great-grandson of Kelly's sister Ellen.

Kelly's skull was stolen from a display case at the Old Melbourne Gaol in 1978. A 2009 claim by a West Australian farmer that he had Kelly's skull was eventually rejected, but led to the investigation that uncovered his bones.

The Morning Herald said that investigators believed that Kelly's remains were transferred from the Old Melbourne Gaol to the Pentridge prison in 1929, then exhumed with the remains of 33 other people during the investigation in 2009.

This article contains reporting from The Associated Press and msnbc.com staff.

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