What Were the 'Alien Bodies' Shown to Mexico's Congress in 2023?

Background

On 12 September 2023, Mexican journalist and self-described ufologist Jaime Maussan testified under oath before a hearing of Mexico's Congress, presenting two small, desiccated humanoid figures, each with an elongated skull, large eye sockets, and three fingers per hand, that he described as "non-human beings that are not part of our terrestrial evolution." Maussan said the figures had been recovered from a Peruvian archaeological site in 2017 and were roughly 1,000 years old. A forensic doctor accompanying him presented CT scans showing the figures had eggs inside them and structures he interpreted as consistent with an unknown organism. The hearing, held before Mexico's Chamber of Deputies as part of a broader session on unidentified aerial phenomena, was livestreamed and drew international press coverage within hours.

Main Theories

The non-human origin claim

Maussan's central claim was that the figures represented a genuinely unknown, non-terrestrial species, supported by CT imaging showing anatomical features he said did not match any known human or animal skeleton, and by DNA analysis he said Mexico's National Autonomous University (UNAM) had conducted, finding genetic material he characterised as roughly a third unidentifiable. UNAM did not itself confirm this characterisation in any published statement, and no independent geneticist or forensic anthropologist reviewing the publicly available evidence endorsed the non-human interpretation.

The fabricated-artefact finding

Peru's Institute of Legal Medicine and Forensic Sciences opened its own investigation into the same family of figures, concluding in January 2024 that they were composite fabrications: genuine human bone fragments and animal bone, from birds and other species, joined together with modern synthetic adhesives and shaped to simulate a single humanoid skeleton, using construction techniques forensic archaeologist Flavio Estrada stated were inconsistent with any documented pre-Hispanic burial practice. This was not the first such finding against figures from the same source: a 2017 investigation by Peru's state prosecutor's office had already concluded that an earlier set of similar figures were "recently manufactured dolls...covered with a mixture of paper and synthetic glue to simulate the presence of skin."

Common Misconceptions

The CT scans and DNA claims presented at the hearing are sometimes read as though independent scientific institutions had validated the non-human interpretation. They did not: the scans documented the figures' internal structure accurately, which is a different thing from confirming what that structure meant, and the specific genetic and species-identification claims Maussan attributed to UNAM were not corroborated by any published university finding. It is also sometimes assumed the 2024 forensic finding and the 2023 congressional presentation contradict each other in a way that remains unresolved; they do not, since the forensic investigation examined the same figures and reached a specific, evidence-based conclusion about their composition that supersedes Maussan's own interpretation of the earlier scans.

Current Consensus

Peru's own forensic investigators, examining the physical material directly, concluded the figures were modern fabrications built from human and animal bone rather than ancient or non-human remains, a finding consistent with two earlier, independent investigations into related figures from the same source in 2015 and 2017. No institution or specialist outside Maussan's own presentation has endorsed the non-human origin claim. Separately, and on different evidentiary grounds, Peruvian authorities have pursued charges against Maussan concerning the alleged illegal excavation and export of genuine pre-Hispanic human remains used in constructing the figures, a real cultural-heritage matter distinct from the debunked biological claim.

Why This Claim Endures

This case fits a recognisable pattern this site traces through Bob Lazar's Area 51 claims and the broader mythology behind the popular image of the "grey alien": a claim built around physical objects or testimony that specialists can examine directly, rather than an unfalsifiable rumour, tends to generate an unusually sharp before-and-after record once that examination happens. The figures' small size, large eyes, and elongated skull closely echo decades of grey-alien imagery already established in popular culture before 2017, an existing visual template that likely shaped both how the figures were constructed and how audiences reacted to seeing them. The claim also endures because it briefly achieved something few UFO claims do, formal testimony under oath before a national legislature, which gave it institutional weight independent of whether Maussan's own interpretation held up, much as the Cottingley fairy photographs gained credibility partly through Arthur Conan Doyle's public endorsement rather than through evidence that improved over time. This page is part of this site's alien contact claims subtopic, within the broader UFOs and UAPs coverage.