Archive for the ‘Forensic Science’ Category
Saturday, January 26th, 2013
By Tierra S. Briscoe
Humans aren’t the only ones who require special investigation when it comes to criminal cases. Yes, bugs you heard it right, bugs are also required for forensic investigations and analysis. Believe it or not they have been used in forensic investigations since the 14th Century but only in the last 30 years the study of insects has become more prevalent in forensic. This is referred to as Forensic Entomology, which is the study of insect and arthropod biology that relate to any criminal matters. These studies include but aren’t limited to homicide cases, the detection of drugs and poisons, the location where an incident occurred and to determine where and when a wound was inflicted.
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There are three subdivisions in forensic entomology: urban, stored-product and medico-legal forensic entomology. Urban Forensic Entomology focuses on pest infestations in buildings gardens or agreements between tenants and their service providers. Forensic entomology is used to determine what types of pesticides are required to treat the area and who may be at fault for the infestation. Stored-product forensic entomology is the investigation of commercially distributed foods that are subject to insect infestation or contamination. Lastly, Medico-legal forensic entomology is probably the most relatable to the name. It deals with the evidence associated with insect studies at scenes including murder, suicide, contraband trafficking, rape and physical abuse. At murder scenes the different life stages of flies could help determine when the murder occurred and also where. Entomotoxicology is a new field covered under medico-legal forensic entomology which focuses on using entomological specimens found at crime scenes to test for possible drugs that could’ve been used to kill the victim.
As much as we hate flies they are one of the most depended upon insects when it comes to death investigations. They are the first insects on the scene of a murder and are attracted to a fresh moist body for their larvae to feed on. The different life stages of flies located at a crime scene could help detectives determine the post mortem interval. The next insects to show up are beetles that feed on a more decomposed body when it begins to dry out and can be replaced by moth flies. They are followed by mites and moths who are key factors in the last stages of total decomposition of a corpse.
From the stage of insect development to the type of insect present there are different factors that determine these things. Bugs aren’t the hardest to accommodate but they are picky when it comes to inhabiting bodies. Factors such as moisture levels, sun exposure, air exposure, bodies of water, geography and weather all determine the different insects present at death scenes and the stages of development. If the body is humid and low in moisture maggot levels will increase rapidly.
Whether we like it or not we all depend on each other one way or another. Investigators depend on insects to determine factors that are impossible to find out unless you were actually present and humans provide these pests with a means of survival. New techniques are being developed and advanced everyday thanks to new discoveries.
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Friday, November 30th, 2012
There are many different things that could happen with forensics in the future. It may look a lot like what you see on TV or even more high-tech and imaginative. With the way the science and technology fields are growing one can only hope that we will see advancements in forensic science techniques.
Many of the forensic accomplishments that are seen on TV are just not possible with current technology, but could be sometime in the future. For example, we currently do not have the technology to definitively match an unknown fingerprint or bullet casing to one that is in a computer database of known criminals or crimes. The database will give us some possible matches but it is not able to actually find an undisputed match. A trained examiner is responsible for ultimately making the identification from the possible matches the database has produced. If a computer could actually get to that standard of analysis it could save the examiners a great deal of time. Of course legally an examiner would most likely still have to verify the computer’s work.
In the future there may also be new techniques and methods for dusting for and lifting fingerprints, such as what is being accomplished with gel lifters. The gel lifters have recently been introduced to forensics in the United States and are able to lift prints from surfaces that have historically been impossible to lift prints from. There may also be new chemicals or methods to detect if there is blood or even DNA at a crime scene. These possible advancements all depend on the research of scientists working today.
There are more and more people going to school to pursue a career in forensics. They range from the crime scene investigator to the forensic accountant. If you are interested in forensics but not all of the science that often accompanies it, try to see if there is a way to relate your particular area of study to crime solving. Forensic science is really any discipline that you can relate to the law, so even though being an accountant is not really a “science” it is part of forensics because it can be used to solve a case.
Tags: advancements, careers, forensics science
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Wednesday, July 18th, 2012
By Virginia Farrell
Eugène Vidocq, the father of modern criminology and the inspiration for the Vidocq Society
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Sherlock Holmes may claim to be the world’s first “consulting detective,” but he’s not the only one any longer. Enter the Vidocq Society.
Born in France in 1775, Eugène Vidocq, noted criminal-turned-detective, fell in and out of trouble (and prison) from the age of thirteen until thirty-four, when he offered up his services as an informant to the French police. After a couple years working undercover, Vidocq created France’s first undercover detective bureau, the Sûreté Nationale, the inspiration for both Scotland Yard and the F.B.I. Vidocq himself inspired several characters in works by Victor Hugo, Honoré de Balzac, and Edgar Allen Poe.
The founders: William Fleisher, Richard Walter, and Frank Bender
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Named in honor of Vidocq, the Society, based in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, consists of retired and current members of forensic and law enforcement professions. The founding members include former FBI and U.S. Customs Special Agent William Fleisher, pseudo-psychic forensic sculptor Frank Bender, and forensic psychologist and profiler Richard Walter. The three friends wanted to create a place where “like-minded persons, in and out of forensics, could gather to discuss and debate crimes and mysteries.” Since their first meeting in 1990, the organization has mushroomed into one hundred and fifty members, and found its final resting place in the Union League of Philadelphia, a Victorian brownstone built in the mid-1800s.
The Union League of Philadelphia, the current home of the Vidocq Society
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A society of distinguished criminologists, the Vidocq Society offers its detective services free of charge, and even pays for the travel expenses of those who come to plead their case in Philadelphia. There are qualifications, though. The Vidocq Society will only consider unsolved murder cases more than two years old (and therefore a “cold case”) with non-criminal victims presented to them by the appropriate law enforcement agency. If a case is selected, the appropriate official will travel to Philadelphia to present their case at one of the Society’s monthly lunches. If one or more of the members are interested in the case, they can form a subcommittee for further investigation.
“When you bring
all this expertise together…it’s
one stop shopping.”
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The Vidocq Society has an excellent track record when it comes to the cases it takes on–as one local police chief they helped enthused, “When you bring all this expertise together…it’s one stop shopping.” They’ve helped solve several high-profile cold cases, including that of the infamous John List. The religious List methodically murdered his mother, wife, daughter, and two sons in 1971 in New Jersey, explaining in a note that he was sending them to heaven, and disappeared without a trace. Eighteen years later, in 1989, Bender and Walter aided America’s Most Wanted in capturing List. Walter created a profile for him, claiming he would be remarried, wearing a suit, involved with the Lutheran Church, and within 300 miles of the crime scene. Using this information, Bender sculpted an “aged” bust of List. Police caught and arrested List almost immediately.
Recently, the society helped the miniscule town of Coquille, Oregon solve the decade-old murder of fifteen year old Leah Freeman. In 2010, Walter helped Coquille Police Chief Mark Dannels discover more evidence in the murder case, and Leah’s then-boyfriend, Nick McGuffin, was arrested for murder.
The Vidocq Society has been covered comprehensively in crime journalist Michael Capuzzo’s book, The Murder Room. Interspersing their most famous cases with in-depth character studies of the three enigmatic founders, Capuzzo brings the society to light almost as well as the Vidocq Society brings criminals to justice. Read an excerpt here.
Tags: Bender, Criminology, Fleisher, Forensic Sculpting, John List, Profiling, Sherlock Holmes, Vidocq, Vidocq Society, Walter
Posted in Cold Cases, Cop's Corner, Crime Fighting, Editorial, Forensic Science, Forensics in The News, Murder, Resources, Uncategorized | No Comments »
Tuesday, July 3rd, 2012
By Virginia Farrell
Sandy Williams, the defendant in a 2000 sexual assault case and the plaintiff in
Williams v. Illinois
No. 10-8505
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On Monday, June 18th, the Supreme Court decided 5-4 that lab technicians do not need to appear for cross-examination, as long as their reports are “out-of-court statements.” This decision stems from sexual assault case in Chicago, now known as Williams v. Illinois No. 10-8505. In 2000, an unidentified man abducted a young woman, forcing her into his car, raping her, and robbing her. The woman then went to a nearby hospital, where doctors performed a rape kit on her, taking vaginal swabs. They sent the swabs to Cellmark Diagnostic Laboratories in Germantown, Maryland. The DNA results matched Sandy Williams, whose DNA sample came from an unrelated arrest. The forensic analyst who took the DNA sample from Williams testified at the trial on her methods and procedures. The prosecutors did not enter the Cellmark DNA report as evidence, and, as a result, no one from the lab testified in the trial. Instead, Sandra Lambatos, the state analyst who conducted the computer search, testified that the two DNA samples matched. In this case, the DNA expert’s testimony was evidence, not Cellmark’s DNA report.
Detail of a lab table in the Orchid Cellmark Laboratory,
the forensic laboratory involved in the case
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This ruling engages with the Sixth Amendment’s Confrontation Clause, which guarantees that “in all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right…to be confronted with the witnesses against him.” The current legal interpretation traces back to the 2004 case Crawford v. Washington, where the Supreme Court ruled that defendants have the right to confront witnesses if the evidence provided is testimonial hearsay, not just if it has an indicia or sign of reliability. Williams v. Illinois casts several previous Supreme Court Confrontation Clause rulings into doubt, including Melendez-Diaz v. Massachusetts in 2007, which ruled the defendant has the right to cross-examine any analyst who prepares any DNA, blood, ballistic or other laboratory reports introduced at a trial. Later, in the 2011 Bullcoming v. New Mexico, Donald Bullcoming appealed his DUI charges, citing a Confrontation Clause violation because his attorneys were unable to cross-examine the exact analyst who performed the blood alcohol level test. The Supreme Court sided with Bullcoming and ruled that the defendant must be able to interrogate the exact lab technician who performed the test, not a colleague or supervisor familiar with the test. In the light of Williams v. Illinois, these rulings, previously clear, seem hazy.
The Williams v. Illinois ruling could have far-reaching consequences for prosecutors, law enforcement agencies, and crime labs nationwide, and many prosecutors and state lawyers consider it a victory. If the Supreme Court had ruled that all analysts and technicians could be called upon to testify, trials would have become even more costly for the government. Testifying would also pull technicians away from crime labs, which could slow down the already backlogged labs, further postponing trials. At the very least, Williams v. Illinois is a ruling of legal efficiency.
Elena Kagen, lead dissenting Supreme Court justice on Williams v. Illinois No. 10-8505
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But is legal efficiency what should matter? Four justices on the Court said no. Dissenters on the Supreme Court included Justices Elena Kagan, Antonin Scalia, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and Sonia Sotomayor. Kagan explained in her dissent: “Before today’s decision, a prosecutor wishing to admit the results of forensic testing had to produce the technician responsible for the analysis. But that clear rule is clear no longer.” Kagan cited a previous case, The People of the State of California v. John Ivan Kocak, where a Cellmark technician, after being cross-examined, admitted to mislabeling samples which wrongly implicated a defendant. With Williams v. Illinois as precedent, in future cases that mistake might not come to light. Kagan also asserted that the splintered majority decision is barely a decision at all, and has “left significant confusion” over whether lab technicians can be called in to testify. With such confusion, can Williams v. Illinois really be called a decision at all?
Tags: Cellmark, Confrontation Clause, DNA analysis, Evidence, Forensic Science, Sixth Amendment, Supreme Court, Williams v. Illinois
Posted in Forensic Science, Forensics in The News, Trials, Uncategorized | No Comments »
Tuesday, June 5th, 2012
by Jaclyn Nicholson
What do John Dillinger, the Anglin Brothers, Frank Morris, Frank W. Abagnale, Jr., Ted Bundy and the Texas Seven have in common? Other their infamous crimes, they have all escaped jail. Believe it or not, many prisoners escape every year. Approximately 3% of all inmates escape at some point during their prison term. Almost all these escapes (89%) are made from minimum security facilities. In fact, for every 11.2 prisoners, there are only 2 guards. A low ratio of guards to prisoners can encourage more escapes. But prisons have trouble attracting guards; pay can be less than $20,000 a year. The turnover rate is over 25% nationally.
Posted in Crime Fighting, Forensic Science, Guest Bloggers, John Dillinger, Uncategorized | No Comments »
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