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Essay on crime investigation process
Principles of criminal investigation
Crime scene investigation process
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On May 22, 2005, the body of Sara Lynn Wineski, a homeless women, was found underneath a deck at the Ronald McDonald House in St. Petersburg. She was forty-nine years old and appeared to be strangled and raped to death. A resident told authorities that they heard screams around 11 p.m. the night before they found her body. DNA evidence was collected that night and years later, police were able to match the DNA from the scene to Raymond Samuels. Testing confirmed that it was Samuels’ DNA that was collected from the scene and also his DNA was found on the belt used to strangle Wineski. By the time they discovered it was Samuels’ DNA, he was already in prison in Ohio, for robbing and attacking an elderly couple. He was sentenced twenty-nine years.
On June 19th of 1990, Robert Baltovich’s girlfriend Elizabeth Bain went missing. Elizabeth told her family that she was going to check the tennis schedules at her school, the University of Toronto Scarborough Campus. She never returned, but her car was eventually recovered. It was found with blood on the backseat, with forensic tests showing that it was Elizabeth’s. With no clear evidence, the “solving” of the case was completely based on eyewitness testimonies, which eventually had Robert arrested for the murder of his girlfriend.
The case of Carla Washburn using the Biopsychosocial approach starts with the biological level and leads to the assessment that Carla suffers from problems with diabetes with insulin dependency. She also suffers from the physical injury she sustained after a recent fall which produced fractures to her body that needs attention. Addressing Carla’s Psychological level she exhibits symptoms of depression due to the belief that she has no one. Due to the fact that she had lost her husband fifteen years ago, moreover she also had lost both her son to a car crash and her grandson who she had raised after both parents died in a car crash to the war in Afghanistan. She also is worried about her finance because she is concerned that Medicare will not
A horrific murder happened in tiny Skidmore on December of 2004. Lisa Montgomery and Bobbi Jo Stinnett met and found out that they had much in common and became good friends (Nunes 85-86). Surprisingly, Bobbi and Lisa met in an internet chat room. Bobbi was into puppy breeding and she occasionally served as a judge. Lisa lived in Kansas where her close friends were shocked about what she was talking about. Of course, Lisa shrugged it off and she sent an email to Bobbi saying that she wanted to see the puppies (Nunes 85-86). When Lisa met Bobbi Jo she had a fake name which was Darlene Fisher because she didn’t want Bobbi to know her real identity. When Lisa sent Bobbi the email she had a criminal intent on her mind. She was planning to choke Bobbi into unconsciousness and then cut open her womb and steal Bobbi’s unborn baby. When Lisa arrived at the house she threw a rope around Bobbi’s neck and choked her until she was unconscious. That is when Lisa took a knife and started to cut open Bobbi’s stomach. Lisa had to cut through skin, fat, and muscle to get to Bobbi’s uterus. Bobbi’s baby was in eight-month gestation; Lisa cut and tied the baby’s cord. Lisa stole the baby and fled to her house in Kansas. Unfort...
found behind the guest house was proven by DNA testing to have O.J.'s blood and
“DNA Testing and the Death Penalty.” ACLU: American Civil Liberties Union. 3 Oct. 2011. Web. 22 April 2014.
In 1989 the National Research Council Committee on DNA Technology in Forensic Science was developed due to numerous scientific and legal issues (The Evaluation of Forensic DNA Evidence). The National Research Council’s key role was to analyze statistical and population genetic issues in the use of DNA evidence and review major alternative approaches to statistical evaluation of DNA evidence (The Evaluation of Forensic DNA, 50). Over the past fifteen years DNA profiling has made tremendous advancements and continuous improvements in the fight against violent
Katherine Stang presented her thesis titled, Issues in Forensic Identification and the Use of Single Nucleotide Polymorphisms (SNPs). Short Tandem Repeat (STR) technology is a forensic analysis that looks at specific regions or loci found on nuclear DNA. There are 13 core loci that the FBI uses as a standard for the Combined DNA Index System (CODIS). More recently single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) have gotten a lot of attention for its use in forensic DNA testing. A SNP array is variation at a single site in DNA and is the most abundant variation in the human genome with over four million identified in the human genome. Some of the advantages of SNP are their high occurrence in the genome, use in lineage testing due to low mutation rates, and their use in degraded samples by using short amplicons. Ms. Stang presented the following case study as an example of the use of SNPs in degraded DNA samples: a charred femur bone badly degraded by time and environmental conditions was found and though STR failed to type the sample, SNP was successful. Ms. Stang said that further work is needed in the area of SNPs and should include an agreement on how SNPs should be used in forensic labs, additional studies to determine optimal procedures, and research into the area of sexual assault evidence.
In July of 1994, a little girl named, Megan Kanka, was raped and strangled. They found her body near her home in Hamilton Township, New Jersey. The story of thing young girl has shocked the nation. The man responsible for this brutal act is named, Jesse Timmendequas. He had been convicted twice prior to this attack.
The collection of DNA in an investigation is used most often to determine who the perpetrator(s) might be in a crime. There has been a rapid growth since its inception and legal and ethical issues have arisen. In the Double –Helix Double-Edged ...
...case is based only on this piece of evidence that has the possibility of a lab mistake, the chance of an error should be taken into account. It should also be recognized because the simple solution to wrong convictions based on one piece of possibly inaccurate evidence is to stop making convictions based only on DNA evidence. As stated by Judge Andrew Haesler, “As judges, lawyers, experts and potential jurors, we want evidence and results that make our already difficult jobs easier. We would love so expert to ease the burden of our judgement by saying, ‘This is the answer.’” (Haesler 9). However, as DNA technology stands today, it is not perfect, nor will it ever be. DNA evidence can never be a certain way to convict a suspect, it can only be used as support to convict a suspect along with other relevant evidence. DNA evidence alone does not suffice for conviction.
Before the 1980s, courts relied on testimony and eyewitness accounts as a main source of evidence. Notoriously unreliable, these techniques have since faded away to the stunning reliability of DNA forensics. In 1984, British geneticist Alec Jeffreys of the University of Leicester discovered an interesting new marker in the human genome. Most DNA information is the same in every human, but the junk code between genes is unique to every person. Junk DNA used for investigative purposes can be found in blood, saliva, perspiration, sexual fluid, skin tissue, bone marrow, dental pulp, and hair follicles (Butler, 2011). By analyzing this junk code, Jeffreys found certain sequences of 10 to 100 base pairs repeated multiple times. These tandem repeats are also the same for all people, but the number of repetitions is highly variable. Before this discovery, a drop of blood at a crime scene could only reveal a person’s blood type, plus a few proteins unique to certain people. Now DNA forensics can expose a person’s gender, race, susceptibility to diseases, and even propensity for high aggression or drug abuse (Butler, 2011). More importantly, the certainty of DNA evidence is extremely powerful in court. Astounded at this technology’s almost perfect accuracy, the FBI changed the name of its Serology Unit to the DNA Analysis Unit in 1988 when they began accepting requests for DNA comparisons (Using DNA to Solve Crimes, 2014).
Kevin, Johnson. “DNA clears Ramsey family in JonBenet’s death.” USA Today n.d.: MAS Ultra-School Edition. Web. 20. Feb. 2014.
A 15 year old girl name Lynda Mann was abducted in Narborough, England. The following day, the police found her body, and learned that she was raped and murdered. Three years later, another young woman had the same thing done to her just like Lynda Mann; she was abducted, raped and murdered. A man named Richard Buckland confessed to the second murder. A DNA analyst performed a method known as genetic fingerprinting. Through this, there was no match to the murder. This meant that Buckland was not guilty of the crime he confessed to.
Singer, Julie A. "The Impact Of Dna And Other Technology On The Criminal Justice System: Improvements And Complications."Albany Law Journal Of Science & Technology 17.(2007): 87. LexisNexis Academic: Law Reviews. Web. 10 Mar. 2014.
From Lydia’s case, we can see the science such as DNA testing can prove the true in a court, and it is enough to be evidence which would let people die.