Winners

While all the five students did a great job of researching the field of Forensic Science and preparing for the presentation, two students went above and beyond the call of duty in their participation and contribution to the team.
Mr. David Kellogg and I are pleased to announce the winner of the first prize ($100.00 Gift Certificate from Best Buy) is Thomas Reichert of ROWVA School District. The second prize winner ($50.00 Best Buy Gift Certificate) is James Dykeman of ROWVA School District. Congratulations to Tom and James!

Board Presentation

The students did a fantastic presentation on Forensic Science to the Carl Sandburg College Board of Trustees at their regular meeting on July 24th in Carthage, Illinois. The following were the topics that were presented:
•Thomas A. Reichert – Fingerprint Analysis
•Duncan L. Nall – Footwear Impressions
•Donald G. Von Kannon – DNA Analysis
•P. Ian Stewart – Post-Mortem Examination
•James N. Dykeman – Forensic Entomology

They were presented with their Certificates of Participation by the Board Chairman, Mr. John Huston.

Troubles with footprints

Footprint analysis is a great field in forensics but there are some problems with it. First of all a criminal can throw out his own shoes after the crime to avoid being identified or he can just wear someone elses shoes to make a false lead. Also in the event that a person may be still alive in a crime scene, EMTs will rush right over the prints causing more confusion. There's also weather to be conserned about with outdoor prints. These aren't like the footprints on the moon that will last forever, because theres rain and wind and erosion to worry about. Plus how long will indoor ones last anyway. What about the footprints that were set before the crime? Will those still be there. Maybe looking for latent prints is completely useless. It's these problems that make this area of forensics not as strong as say dna analysis or fingerprint examination, but the person did have to enter and leave the scene, and whether or not he had shoes or socks or was barefoot, he had to have left prints

Crime scenes

This information might be useful to everyone. When a crime is first reported there are things that must be dealt with first such as the victim in need of help or the perpatraitor having a weapon that must be secured. Then they must detain the eyewitnesses and interview them separately and whoever reported the crime. Then the scene is taped off along with any other crime scenes (places where body was found, where weapons were found etc.). If there isn't an emergency it is important not to disturb the body or any other evidence. Then the scene is searched in a very organized manner, like a grid system or a spiral one, or even one just a back and forth line system. There are many jobs on the crime scene ( of course that doesn't help preserving footprints but owell,) such as photographer, sketcher, measurer, evidence collector, and master note takers. After evidence is collected, transported, preserved, and stored carefully, the scene may be recreated either mentally or physically and adding in or throwing out witnesses testimonies. In the movie (12 angry men) the alleged murderer is found innocent not by finding evidence that leads to someone else but because the witnesses testimonies were insuffient.

Western

So we took our trip to WIU on saturday. Whille the trip was mostly geared towards western university itself, it did help show us some of the facilities that we would have at our disposal if we were to pursue a carrer in forensics.

Trip to Western

So Saturday we went to Western for a "discover Western day." It was mostly geared towards "advertising" the school, but we did get to learn about forensics. It was definitely worth it. All I am doing now is getting ready for the big presentation that we've been preparing for. Doing some last minute research, writing my speech, practicing what I am going to say...all the fun stuff. Wish me luck!

Western

The trip to WIU may not have been as hands on as the trip to chicago or to peoria, but we really did learn quite a bit about the importance of forensics. I think it was a good field trip to go to right before the presentation. As for the presentation i am currently working on my speech for my first slide only which will be mainly stressing why shoe prints are unique and the uses of shoeprint analysis. I am hoping to get it around a minute twenty so the rest of the time i can talk about procedures of lifting and photographing footprints. Theres so much info but so little time

Discover Western Day

Last saturday we went and visited Western Illnios Univercity while this trip seemed more geared towards getting people to come to there school than forensic science we learned some about their criminal justice program which is one of the best in the state so if I had plans to become a police officer that would probably be one of the best choices in the state to attend




Ian got a little tired after a hard day on discovering western and James was happy to lend him a shoulder

Requirements

In case they ask us the requirements of our field i found out that to become a forensic impressionist ( usually there are just impression analysists and not just footwear) they must have graduated from a 4 year college, majored in forensics, chemistry, or biology, know physics and photography, be able to distinguish little differences in prints, know the rules of evidence collection and chain of custody, and to be able to express complex findings clearly. Hopefully they won't ask us this because its boring but its good to know it just in case.

Power Point

Well, yesterday i got the PP put together, and got some input from the team members on a few changes for it. I still need to grammar check it (spell check is done). When we meet tuesday im sure that there will be some changed that need to be made, but for the most part i am confident that our PP is 95% complete.

See you all tomorrow!

Forensic Photography

I found some information on how they take the photos of the impressions they find at the crime scenes. They take lots of photos because it is cheap and very effective at recording info. When they find the print they usually take a photo up close, mid distance , and far away. Some states won't allow photos to be taken with anything else in the picture due to obstructing the view. But usually photos are take both with and without a ruler and a north indicator. Photos should be taken after every stage of the lifting process because lifting is dangerous and evidence must be obtained. They are usually taken at a 90 degree angle with a 45 degree angle flash to avoid distortion. Photographs help refresh investigators mind right before a court case and may reveal information that wasn't found before. Maybe ill include some of the photography in my speech.

15 days

There is 15 days until the Presentation and we've been in this intership for about 23 days, so there is still plenty of time to learn more on our topics. The more we know on our topics the better we will be able to freely talk on our topics for the presentation and not just read the slides. Today Tom put the slideshow together and it doesn't seem like it will be tacky (sound effects, stupid animations) but just very simple It seems that all that is left to do is figure out what we want to say as the show goes by. I have 3 slides so i'm hoping to spend about a minute on each slide. I'll probablly throw a few pictures in there too

Presentation

So yesterday we started putting together the presentation. We picked a format and made some final decisions. Then we went across the hall to learn from Jon with the Upward Bound guys. He actually had a lot of projects and learning materials that the Upward Bound-sters learned from. I'd say we already knew quite a lot, but there still would've been more to learn from if we had the time to actually go through the projects, but we still learned stuff anyway. Today, we sent Thomas our slides (except for me, since I had a little trouble making mine short enough, but they're done now) so that he could compile them into our big presentation. I'll send him mine tomorrow, and then we're having our run-through on Tuesday. Now I think I'll make some note cards.

Piecing it together

Today we mainly worked on our power point presentation. We all made our own little section and sent it to Thomas so we could out them all together. I felt my slides did not have very much on them, but I plan on talking a lot and saying some info that isn't on the power point, like cases where different techniques were used, where entomology can be applied, etc. Now I just need to write the speech...

Power Point

So i got just about everyone's PP slides fit into the presentation, just need Ian to send me his and then i will get to work with the animation formatting. Its looking really nice at this point, and i feel that we will have a great presentation for the board.

Working towards the presentation

Today we all started putting our power points together for the presentation in front of the board members Everyone is making a few slides and them sending them to tom who is putting them all together in one power point and making sure they all look the same its coming along nicely and i think that we will be ready for the meeting when it comes

Footprints and impressions. Random facts

I said in an earlier post that there wasn't a database for every shoe in the country, this is true, but i found out that the fbi does work with some shoe manufactuers to get a pretty good database of different brands and types of shoes. Everyones stride is different and it shows in how your shoes wear down; some walk mostly on the back of their shoes and some more on the sides, and if you're a runner they may be on the balls of the feet. Stride or longitudal distance from foot to foot can tell height, and the lateral distance can tell weight, because a long narrow stride wouldn't belong to a short fat man. This stuff paints a picture. Footprints can also make a trail to where items were stashed like gloves or weapons. If the same footprints show up in multiple crime scences then the crimes may be linked. If there are 3 different sets of prints then there were 3 people involved in the crime. Investigator's prints are also taken as a precaution, but they may wear surgical booties or walk on coasters to prevent excess prints. A few methods to avoid surface erosion where making casts of a print are practical too. Spraying hairspray on sand keeps the shape, blowing mud dry with a hair dryer, and using snow wax makes the surfaces retain shape. There is also a method for carpet that i can't remember.

Procedures

Since latent footprints can be invisible to the naked eye, it is very important not to disturb them when setting up a crime scene as to not destroy any evidence. Criminals may wear gloves to avoid fingerprints but most of them don't know about shoeprints so these are a great way to obtain evidence. When taping up a crime scene, the officer in charge should leave enough space for the entry and exit, because the criminal had to come in and out of the scene. Usually the room is made dark and prints are searched for with an oblique lighting source. Outside prints are usually searched for first due to weather. When an officer should enter a crime scene he should use a stepping into your own footsteps procedure as to not make any more prints than necessary. When prints are found it is important to photograph them before they are cast or lifted and in multiple angles with a scale included such as a ruler. When the casts are done they shouldn't be cleaned but left to dry for 2 days. Searching for footprints should deffinitely be one of the top priorities when searching a crime scene. Another interesting fact that can be obtained from shoe size is that the length of a persons foot divided by .15 equals their height. I have size 13 shoes but only 11.5 inch feet so if you do the math it will give you 74 inches which is pretty close to my height. Another interesting fact is that when carrying heavy weights your foot prints are actually deeper, and when running it is more exaggerated at the toe and heel regions