Dr. Kathleen Joan Reichs (PhD) (née Toelle, born July 7, 1948) is an American crime writer, forensic anthropologist and academic.

[6] She has assisted Clyde Snow and the Foundation for Guatemalan Forensic Anthropology in an exhumation in the area of Lake Atitlan in the highlands of southwest Guatemala.

She is also affiliated with the Laboratoire des Sciences Judiciaires et de Médecine Légale for the province of Quebec.

[12] She has also co-written (with her son Brendan) the young adult novels series named Virals, centered on Tempe's great-niece, Tory Brennan, and a pack of her friends, Ben, Hiram, Shelton, and wolfdog Cooper.

[15] As in the books, Brennan (Emily Deschanel) is a forensic anthropologist; however, there are many differences: the television character is younger, more socially awkward,[15] and is based in the Jeffersonian, a fictionalized version of the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C.[15] Additionally, the Brennan character in the TV series moonlights as an author,[14] writing about a fictional forensic anthropologist named Kathy Reichs.

[15] She appeared in the second-season episode "Judas on a Pole", playing Professor Constance Wright, a forensic anthropologist on the Jeffersonian's board of trustees who conducts Zack Addy's dissertation defense.

Reichs was reluctant to get involved, but later agreed and performed a full skeletal analysis of Anthony's daughter, Caylee, but could not determine a cause of death.