Saturday, December 3, 2011

Part IX: Crime Scene Investigation

This part of learning about Forensics tested everything that we have learned over the past few months. When we walked into the calssroom there were three rows. Each row had its own crime scene, my group and I were given an outdoor scene in which a decomposed body, three fingerprints, possible poison, a suicide letter, hair, fiber, two different footprints, and a syringe were found. Using these clues we had to determine a possible victim, and suspect from the line up that was presented on the board. When choosing the victims and suspects we had to be very careful because each suspect on the board was being used for all three crime scenes, this mean that the use of al of our evidence was extremely important.

The first thing that we did as a group was to piece together the suicide letter, the letter read "Please forgive me! I love you all.", we then compared the letter to handwriting samples given by the suspects on the board, the handwriting matched that of Lucas Moore, man who had spent time in a psych. ward because of depression. We then compared fingerprints found at the scene to those of Lucas Moore and the others. Lucas Moore's fingerprint matched exhibit number three which was a plain arch, we then compared exhibit number eight an undeveloped fingerprint, the print was a ulnar loop, and it matched that of Sandra O'Conner a homless drug addict convicted of drug possession and breaking/entering. The third and final fingerprint was that of Jet Trong, it was also a double loop print, a mechanic who had been convicted of drug possession, breaking/entering, and domestic violence. The hair found at the scene appeared to be dog hair, and the fiber was determined to ahve been wool. After testing the possible poison it was determined to have been cocaine, the syringe that we found could have been used by the suspect or the vitim to ingest the cocaine. We then analyzed the footprints and detetermined that, based on the size of the prints,  the one found on the victims body was that of a female, and that the other print belonged to a tall male. At the time the body was found we determined that the time of death would have been about two weeks before the body was discovered do to the maggots and the decomposition.

After analyzing all the evidence we each came up with a thought for how the victim had died and who had been involved in the possilbe murder. My thought was that the victim was Sandra O'Conner. Her fingerprints were found at the scene and the shoe found on the body looked like that of a female. Since she was convicted of drug posession it seemed plausible that she would have access to such a drug, she was also homeless so it made since that she would be found in the woods. I hypothesized that the drugs had been bought from Jet Trong, he also had been convicted of drug possession, since his fingerprints were also found at the scene this also seemed possible. Since Lucas Moore's fingerprints were also found at the scene along with the note that matched his handwriting. I took into consideration that Moore was a depressed man, so my thought was that he was taking the drugs as a way to feel better becasue of his deppression. The dog hair was foud because Sandra had a dog at the scene, he might have run away in search for food. Overall my thought is that sandra O'Conner bought drugs from Jet Trong. Somehow Sandra and Lucas knew each other, so they went into the woods to do drugs together. Things got out of hand and Sandra overdosed on the cocaine, and in an attempt to cover up the death and the fact that he had been doing drugs Lucas wrote a suicide note in the hopes that nobody would think he had murdered her.



Part VIII: Witness Experiment

When running an Investigation witness are a important part of the process. The witness experiment was designed as a way to determine if we could, like a witness, remember a face. In our groups we found pictures fo the same size, we then took the pictures and cut out the features, such as the lips and nose, we then mixed up the features. Using just our memories we had to recreate the face. This experiment was mean to teach how the witness part of a investigation works, to also give us an idea of how difficult it can be to remember the faces, and also to teach us the importance of remembering a witness and how this can affect a entire investigation.

Below are some images from the experiment.



Part VII:Create a Profile

In one day we were given, miscellaneuosly, a few pieces of evidence such as; a piece of hair, a fingerprint, anything that would be helpful when solving a crime.With the given materials we were told to come up with a scenario to explain what happend to the person. My group was given a fingerptint, a piece of paper that at first galnce, what appeared to be either some type of juice or lip gloss, and a letter that had been ripped. We peiced the letter together to find out what kind of letter it actually was and to determine what it said, the letter read; "You will never find her". Using the letter, fingerprint, and the liquid substance, which was determined to be juice, we came up with what we thought was a likely scenario, and then shared it with the group. My scenario was that a female was at her home drinking some type of juice, when she heard a knock at her door. She got up from the place that she was sitting and answered the door, based on the spilled juice it looks like a struggle took place. We thought that she probably knew the person at the door because she allowed them in, the fingerprint would be sent to the police department to be run  through the machine to determine if it matched someone in the database. My scenario was based on facts and showed how a investigation might be carried out.

Friday, December 2, 2011

Part VI: Drug Analysis

History of Drug Analysis:
At the Age of the Enlightenment and the Rennisance the studies of Paracelsus and Orfila began to shape. Paracelsus determined that specific chemicals were responsible for the toxicity of plants and animals, he also determined that the efects on the human body by chemicals is dependent upon the dose. Orfila a Spanish physician is often credited for founding toxicology.  The first person to use a cemical method for detecting poisons was Dr. Hermann Boerhaave. He would place sustances that were thought to contian poison on hot red coals and test for the smell to determine if the substances was in fact a chemical.

Drug Testing:
Toxicology tests or "Tox Screens" can be done through Blood tests, Urine tests, and Tissue samples. Each of these test can and will show the amount of a drug substance that a person has ingested, if any. When
testing the blood from a body during a autopsy, the blood is generally taken from two places, the heart and the femoral vain that is in the leg. Blood is taken from both places because the concentration of the drugs can be different, by taking blood from the vein and the heart the accuracy of the tests are boosted. Urine samples can be taken if there is any left in the body, tissue samples are taken from many of the organs; including the liver, brain, and kidney. When the tissue sample has been taken it is placed in a specimen container so that screening can begin. There are gas there are three major types of toxicology test; Gas chromotography, mycrocrystalline, Spectrophotometry, but there are, of course, many other tests that I havent mentioned. Gas Chromotography is used to determine the amount of alcohol that is in the blood. The sample is placed into a heated reaction chamber where it will vaporize, meaning that it will become a gas. The sample is moved through the stationary phase column. The elements in the sample separate while in the tube and at the end of the column. Each component generates there own individual electrical impulses that are recorded as a chromatogram of response versus the time. So a chromatogram usually turns out as a number of uneven peaks which can be identified by comparing the shape and time they came out with a reference chromatogram or a control sample. This test is just one of how the tests work and how they test for alcohol and drug levels in substances.

Cases Involving Drug Analysis:
On August 27, 2003 at the Gustaf Adolph Lutheran Church after service over two dozen members went to the recreation area for doghnuts and coffee, at first everything was normal, but in a change of events over a dozen members became violently ill, samples were taken from the members and sent to the toxicology lab of the Maine Public Safety Department. Over the next few day one of the churches oldest members Walter Reid died at the age of 78, the test that had been run on the coffee smaples determined that the cause of the illness and eath was arsenic poisining. Daniel Bondeson a member of the same church that Reid attended shot himself in the test and died during surgery, a suicide note was found in which he admitted to the crimes, he says that he only wanted to give evryone "bellyaches". This is an example of how something that starts out as a joke can turn serious when playing with harmful drugs.


                                                                                     Drug Testing Project:
In our lab class we were given a project in which we were given different substances that were meant to mimc different types of drugs. Using different types of indicators such as bromothymol blue, phenolphthalein, and ph paper, we were able to determine the ph of the different substances. The ph of the substance allowed us to determine if the substnace was in fact a drug. For example my group and I were given three samples that were suposed to be Aspirin, using Bromothymol blue and ph paper we tested to make sure that this was true, the bromothymol blue turned yellow indicating that it was a acid, bromothymol blue will turn green in nuetral substances, and blue in base solutions. Then using ph paper we indicated that the substance we were testing had a ph of 3, this means that it was an acid, using these two tests we were able to determine that the first  substance was Aspirin but the other two samples were not. The Picture above shows all the chemicals (indicators) used to analyze the substances so that we could determine the type of drug and whether or not it was a drug.

Sources:
http://www.mshp.dps.mo.gov/MSHPWeb/PatrolDivisions/CLD/Toxicology/toxicology.html

http://www.trutv.com/library/crime/criminal_mind/forensics/toxicology/index.html

http://www.emeraldinsight.com/content_images/fig/0170950502002.png

http://www.bxscience.edu/publications/forensics/articles/toxicology/r-toxi01.htm