Forensic Science

“Autopsy” means “to see with one’s own eyes,” which doesn’t seem like an appropriate term to describe the examination of a dead body.

Forensic botany is also recognized as a forensic science; although is not widely practiced, some of its applications include the analysis of pollens, wood, and some plants such as marijuana, psilocybin mushrooms, and peyote cactus.

The major difference between anatomic and clinical pathology is the purpose for which the examination is being carried out.

Many forensic pathologists, anthropologists, and entomologists describe their work as storytelling. They have a body, or the remains of a body, that cannot talk about how or why he or she died.

even if the print matches the suspect’s, it doesn’t prove that they committed the burglary and it doesn’t show when the print was left on the window. It only proves that the suspect left that print at some time in the past.

Testimonial evidence is oral or written: an eyewitness to a bank robbery can testify that at 4 pm she saw someone wearing blue jeans and a white tee shirt run out of the bank, holding a large sack and shooting a gun back into the bank. The gun, the sack, and her statement about what she witnessed will be evidence at the trial

evidence.” Think of evidence as being anything that helps prove or disprove something about the crime being investigated. Evidence can be objects, like guns, drugs, or blood; circumstances, such as a location or an alibi;

Real evidence arises directly from criminal activity: examples are blood, fingerprints, fibers, and drugs. Demonstrative evidence is generated by police investigators or witnesses to illustrate or graphically depict evidence: examples are crime scene sketches, photographs, models, and videotapes of a crime scene

Every time a person walks into a room they bring in material from outside: bits of soil, fibers, dandruff, and so on. This extraneous material could be confused with evidence.

unit may consist of a photographer and one or more technicians who will search for evidence, document it, collect it, put it in secure packaging and take it to the property room of the police department.