Sketching Allows the Investigator to Combine Notes and Photography

Primary Body

Chapter 8: Crime Scene Management

"Crime scene management, and evidence management as a critical office of that, must exist learned and incorporated into the investigator's toolkit."

Crime scene direction skills are an extremely significant task component of investigation because prove that originates at the crime scene will provide a motion-picture show of events for the court to consider in its deliberations. That picture will be composed of witness testimony, crime scene photographs, physical exhibits, and the analysis of those exhibits, along with the analysis of the crime scene itself. From this chapter, yous volition larn the task processes and protocols for several important bug in crime scene management. These include:

1. Note taking
2. Securing a crime scene
3. Testify direction
4. Scaling the investigation to the event

Topic one: Notation Taking

Although other documents volition be created past the investigator to manage the criminal offense scene, no other certificate will be equally important to the investigator every bit the notebook. The notebook is the investigator's personal reference for recording the investigation.

Many variations of law notebooks have emerged over the years. The court will sometimes even accept constabulary notes that take been made on a bit of paper if that was the only newspaper available at the time. However, beyond extreme circumstances, in operational investigations, the accepted parameters of a law notes and notebooks are:

• A volume with a cover page that shows the investigators name, the date the notebook was started, and the date the notebook was concluded
• Sequential page numbers
• A leap booklet from which pages cannot be torn without detection
• Lined pages that permit for neat scripting of notes
• Each entry into the notebook should start with a time, date, and instance reference
• Bare spaces on pages should not be left betwixt entries and, if a blank space is left, information technology should be filled with a single line fatigued through the infinite or a diagonal line drawn across a page or partial page infinite
• Whatsoever errors fabricated in the notebook should simply exist crossed out with a single line fatigued through the error, and this should not be done in a manner that makes the fault illegible

In court, the investigator's notebook is their best reference document. When testifying, the court will allow an investigator to refer to notes fabricated at the fourth dimension to refresh their memory of events and actions taken. When an investigator'south notebook is examined past the courtroom, notes consistent with the investigator's testimony provide the court with a circumstantial assurance or truthfulness that the evidence is accurate and truthful (McRory, 2014). Alternately, if critical portions of the investigation are not properly recorded or are missing from the notebook, those portions of the evidence will be more closely scrutinized by the defence. The court may give those unrecorded facts less weight in its final deliberations to decide proof beyond a reasonable uncertainty.

For an investigator, skillful notes are an overview of the things seen/heard and the actions taken. A chronology of notes demonstrates the investigator's mental map of the facts that led to forming reasonable grounds for an arrest and charges. Court cases are often extended past adjournments, appeals, or suspects evading immediate capture. This can extend the time between the investigation and the trial past several years. In these protracted cases, it becomes critical for the investigator to have detailed notes that accurately reflect their investigation to trigger their memory of the facts.

As of import every bit the notebook is, note taking skills are often an underemphasized aspect of law training. Most police investigators develop their personal skills and note taking strategies through on the chore experience and in the "trial by fire" of cross test in courtroom. This void in the grooming of note taking skills is likely due to the broad range of circumstances under which annotation taking needs to take place and because it is impossible to conceptualize what facts will become important in every possible variation of circumstances. Thus, some combination of training, mutual sense, and experience will come into play for investigators to get expert in recognizing what to tape in their notebook.

The concept of "notes made at the time of an event is a rather misleading definition and requires some explanation. In an platonic earth, an investigator would be able to go on through an investigation with an open up notebook and record each fact and each ascertainment of events as they transpire. Of grade, the way events unfold is dynamic and unpredictable. Circumstances often require an investigator to be fully engaged in efforts to bring a state of affairs nether control, while protecting the life and safety of persons. There is no identify for an open notebook in such cases and the investigator is conspicuously not taking any notes at that fourth dimension, but will do so after the result is under control, and as soon as information technology is practical to do and so. Although the typical reference in court is to notes made at the time, in actuality, they are notes made as presently as practical under the unique circumstances of the upshot.

The courts practise accept the operational dynamics that exists for investigators, and information technology sometimes becomes a question at trial to know when the notes were actually equanimous. As such, an investigator should always be prepared to answer this question. Having a note in the notebook regarding the time when the writing of notes was and finished acts as a reference to demonstrate awareness and attention to this issue.

Some other issue related to notes fabricated at the time is the dilemma of facts that were overlooked and and then recalled later on the initial notes have been completed. The human retention does have its limitations and flaws. On occasion, an investigator volition complete the initial draft of their notes, and, at some later time may suddenly call back a point that was missed. On such occasions, returning to the pages of notes made at the time and attempting to insert the recalled facts is not an acceptable do. The proper way to tape these later recollections of fact is to immediately commencement a new note page, using the current time and appointment, make a reference to the previous case-notes, previous time, date, and page number, and record the newly recalled fact or facts. These kinds of recalled facts and belatedly entries will be closely examined by defense counsel, and it tin can sometimes exist helpful if the investigator can also make notation of the fact or circumstances that led to the recollection of the additional information. Anyone who has always participated in a critical incident, where life and safety have taken priority, can tell yous that in one case the upshot is under command, investigators can be seen writing intently to document their recollection of the events.

The post-obit strategies are recommended as a general guide to annotation taking:

1. Start notes by creating a big flick perspective and then move from the general to the more specific observations. In this large picture, you are creating a perspective of the facts that you have been made aware of to brainstorm an investigation. These big picture facts go the starting point of your mental map of events, and these facts will be the framework to begin thinking virtually offence recognition and forming reasonable grounds to believe and accept action.
2. In more specific terms, and to the extent it is possible, begin recording all dates, times, and descriptions of persons, places, and vehicles every bit they emerge. You lot may, in fact, take already started a page in your notebook where some exact times, addresses, licence plate numbers, names or persons, and perhaps even blurted statements from a doubtable have been jotted downwardly. It is adequate to use these fundamental pieces of jotted information already recorded to overstate your detailed notes at the stop of the result in a more consummate fashion.
3. Record the identities of persons encountered and how the identity of each person was verified. For example: Witness Jane Doe (DOB: 8 May 64) 34345-8 St Anywhere BC Photograph drivers licence ID
4. Tape all statements made by witnesses and victims to reflect an accurate account of the data being conveyed. It is often not possible to record every statement made verbatim in notes, and, in most cases, it is not necessary. Today, applied science makes it possible to digitally record the verbatim account existence provided by a witness or a victim. Just, merely digitally recording a statement is non sufficient, since statements will frequently form considerations in establishing reasonable grounds for belief to take activity. Recording the critical details beingness conveyed volition provide a written tape of the facts considered to form reasonable grounds for belief.
5. If a person is a suspect or is a person who may become a suspect, brand every endeavor to record whatsoever statements made past that person verbatim. Suspects will frequently exist found at the scene of a crime posing as a witness or even every bit a victim. Accurately recording the initial statements fabricated by such a person tin produce show of guilt in the form of statements that are provably simulated or even incriminating.

Information technology is the personal responsibleness of each investigator to document their personal perception and recollection of the event they are witnessing, every bit it unfolds. In cases where investigators have collaborated on an agreed version of events and authored their notes to reflect those agreed upon facts, the notes are no longer the personal recollection of that investigator and, as such, may exist scrutinized every bit beingness a collective version of events aimed at producing evidence that does not reflect a truthful account of the facts every bit they were witnessed by each individual investigator.

The practise of collaborating and making collective notes is sometimes called "boxing of notes" — this practice can be discovered by defence when the individual notebooks of investigators are identical or close to identical in format and content. The practise of battle of notes has been identified as one of the flaws in investigative practice that can lead to miscarriages of justice (Salhany, 2008). As such, collaboration between investigators when making notes should exist avoided. If, at any point, there is a collaboration to return to an issue together and re-examine physical evidence to clarify the point for each investigator, that collaborative effort should be noted as part of the note making of each investigator.

Despite this circumspection regarding the collective production of notes, there are occasions where a collective notation making process is used and is accepted as reasonable. This occurs during large scale operations involving many participants, sometimes coordinated by an Emergency Operations Command Heart. In these cases, there is a need for the command centre participants to be completely engaged in handling the event, which may extend over periods of hours or days. The practice of each participant waiting until the protracted consequence has been ended to brand their private notes would be impractical and potentially inaccurate. In these cases, it is now accepted operational practice to assign ane person in the command centre to deed as the collective maker-of-notes to substitute for individual annotation-taking. The annotation maker in these situations is known as "The Scribe." For the persons in the control eye to be aware of the notes being fabricated, the Scribe does not make notes into a typical notebook. In such cases, the notes are made onto large pieces of flipchart paper and, every bit each sheet of notes is completed, it is posted onto the wall of the control centre where each participant tin can reference the content of the notes and verify the accurateness of the notes. At the end of the functioning, the collective pages of notes are photographed and the annotation pages are saved by the scribe every bit an showroom. Each page is often initialled by the participants. Under this process, each participant in the command middle may adopt these notes equally a reference document for court purposes.

Topic 2: Integrity of the Crime Scene

Equally part of criminal offense scene management, protecting the integrity of the crime scene involves several specific processes that fall under the Tasks category of the STAIR Tool. These are tasks that must be performed by the investigator to identify, collect, preserve, and protect testify to ensure that it will be accustomed past the court. These tasks include:

a) Locking down the crime scene

b) Setting up crime scene perimeters

c) Establishing a path of contamination

d) Establishing crime scene security

When an investigator arrives at a crime scene, the demand to protect that crime scene becomes a requirement as soon as it has been determined that the criminal event has go an inactive consequence and the investigator has switched to a strategic investigative response. As yous will recollect from the Response Transition Matrix, it is sometimes the example that investigators go far at an agile event in tactical investigative response fashion. In these cases their kickoff priority is to protect the life and safety of people, the need to protect the crime scene and its related evidence is a secondary business concern. This is not to say that investigators attending in tactical investigative response manner should totally ignore show, or should be devil-may-care with show if they can protect it; however, if show cannot be protected during the tactical investigative response mode, the court will accept this as a reality.

As shortly as the outcome transitions to an inactive effect with a strategic investigative response, the expectations of the court, regarding the protection of the criminal offence scene and the testify, volition change. This change means that there is an immediate requirement for the investigator to take control of and lock down that offense scene.

a) Locking Down the Law-breaking Scene

Very frequently, when the change to strategic investigative response is recognized, first responders and witnesses, victims, or the arrested suspect may notwithstanding be inside the crime scene at the conclusion of the agile effect. All these people have been involved in activities at the criminal offence scene up to this point in time, and those activities could have contaminated the crime scene in various ways. Locking down the offense scene means that all ongoing activities within the crime scene must stop, and everyone must get out the offense scene to a location some distance from the crime scene area. Once everyone has been removed from the crime scene, a physical barrier, usually police tape, is placed effectually the outside edges of the criminal offence scene. Defining of the edges of the crime scene with tape is known as establishing a crime scene perimeter. This procedure of isolating the crime scene inside a perimeter is known equally locking down the crime scene.

b) Criminal offense Scene Perimeter

The crime scene perimeter defines the size of the crime scene, and it is up to the investigator to decide how large the crime scene needs to be. The size of a crime scene is usually divers by the area where the criminal acts accept taken place. This includes all areas where the suspect has had whatever interaction or activity inside that scene, including points of entry and points of exit. The perimeter is too divers by areas where the interaction between the suspect and a victim took place. In some cases, where there is extended interaction betwixt a doubtable and a victim over fourth dimension and that action has happened over a distance or in several areas, the investigator may demand to identify one large crime scene, or several smaller criminal offence scene areas to set crime scene perimeters. Considering the three stages of originating show, an investigator may find that pre-crime or post-criminal offence activity requires the crime scene perimeter to environment a larger surface area, or there perhaps even be an additional split law-breaking scene that needs to be considered.

For some crime scenes where in that location are natural barriers, such as buildings with doorways, information technology is easy to create a crime scene perimeter defining admission. This becomes more complicated in outdoor venues or big indoor public venues, where fencing and barricades may exist needed forth with tape markers to define the perimeters.

Once the crime scene perimeter has been established and lock down has taken place, information technology becomes necessary to ensure that no unauthorized persons cross that perimeter. Typically, and ideally, there will only exist one controlled access point to the law-breaking scene, and that indicate will be at the entry point for the path of contamination.

c) Path of Contamination

It is not possible to eliminate all potential contamination of a crime scene. We can merely command and record ongoing contamination with a goal to avoid damaging the forensic integrity of the crime scene and the exhibits. Once a criminal offence scene has been cleared of victims, witnesses, suspects, outset responders, and investigators, it is necessary to record, in notes or a argument from each person, what contamination they have caused to the scene. The information being gathered will document what evidence has been moved, what evidence has been handled, and past whom. With this data, the investigator can found a baseline or condition of existing contamination in the crime scene. If something has been moved or handled in a way that has contaminated that item earlier the lock down, it may still be possible to become an acceptable assay of that particular if the contamination can be explained and quantified.

As an instance, sometimes in cases of serious assaults or even murders, paramedics have been nowadays at the scene treating injured persons. When this treatment is happening, non-suspect-related DNA transfer between persons and exhibits tin occur. Determining those possibilities is one of the outset steps in establishing the level of existing contagion at the time of lock down.

With everyone at present exterior the crime scene and the perimeter locked down, the next step is to plant a designated pathway where authorized personnel can re-enter the crime scene to conduct their investigative duties. This pathway is known as a path of contamination and information technology is established past the starting time investigator to re-enter the crime scene after it has been locked downwards. Prior to re-entering, this first investigator will take a photograph showing the proposed area where the path of contamination will extend, and so, dressed in the sterile crime scene apparel, the investigator will enter and mark the flooring with tape to designate the pathway that others must follow. In creating this pathway, the first investigator will avoid placing the pathway in a location where it will interfere with evidently existing evidence and volition identify information technology only where information technology is required to gain a physical view of the unabridged criminal offence scene. As other investigators and forensic specialists enter the criminal offense scene to perform their duties, they will stay inside the path of contagion and, when they leave the path to perform a specific duty of investigation or exam, they volition tape their departure from the path and volition be prepared to demonstrate their departure from the pathway and explicate any new contamination caused by them, such as dusting for fingerprints or taking exhibits.

d) Crime Scene Security

At the same fourth dimension the offense scene is being divers with perimeter tape, it is also necessary to establish a security system that will ensure that no unauthorized person(s) enters the crime scene and causes contagion. For this purpose, a law-breaking scene security officer is assigned to regulate the coming and going of persons from that criminal offence scene. For the assigned security officer, this becomes a dedicated duty of guarding the crime scene and simply assuasive access to persons who have authorized investigative duties inside the crime scene. These persons might include:

• Forensic specialists
• Search team members
• Assigned investigators, and/or
• The coroner in the case of a sudden death investigation

To maintain a record of everyone coming and going from the crime scene, a document, known equally a "Crime Scene Security Log," is established, and each authorized person is signed in equally they enter and signed out as they depart the scene with a short note stating the reason for their entry. Any unauthorized person who enters or attempts to enter a criminal offence scene should be challenged by the crime scene security officer, and, if that person refuses to go out, they can be arrested, removed from the scene, and charged for obstructing a police officer.

The assigned security officer is responsible for creating and maintaining the Crime Security Log, which tin have various forms. In short term, small scale investigations, it may only crave a single page in the security officer'south note book; however, in a big calibration, long term investigation, the log could include volumes of pages under the care of several assigned security officers working in shifts. Whatever the scale or format, the security log records who attended the scene, when they attended, why they were there, and when they left the scene. An example of a crime scene security log is shown in the following example.

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Topic 3: Evidence Management

As we take already learned in the STAIR tool, analysis is the process that must occur to establish connections between the victims, witnesses, and suspects in relation to the criminal result. The crime scene is often a nexus of those events and consequently, it requires a systematic approach to ensure that the evidence gathered will be acceptable in courtroom.

Exhibits, such as claret, hair, fibre, fingerprints, and other objects requiring forensic analysis, may illustrate spatial relationships through evidence transfers. Other types of physical evidence may establish timelines and coexisting indications of motive, opportunity, or means. All evidence within the physical environment of the crime scene is critically important to the investigative process. At any offense scene, the two greatest challenges to the physical evidence are contamination and loss of continuity.

Contagion of Show

Contamination is the unwanted alteration of evidence that could affect the integrity of the original exhibit or the crime scene. This unwanted alteration of evidence can wipe away original evidence transfer, dilute a sample, or deposit misleading new materials onto an exhibit. Merely as testify transfer between a suspect and the crime scene or the suspect and the victim can establish a coexisting connection, contagion can compromise the analysis of the original evidence transfer to the extent that the court may not accept the analysis and the inference that the assay might otherwise have shown.

Contagion tin can take place in any number of ways including:

• Constabulary or other offset responders interfering with show during a tactical investigative response
• Suspects interfering with the crime scene to comprehend up or remove evidence
• Victims or witnesses treatment evidence
• Animals, including pets, causing unwanted transfer of evidence or even removal of evidence through contact or consumption
• Conditions-related contagion due to rain, wind, or snow diluting or washing away prove, or
• Crime scene investigators declining to follow proper crime scene management procedures and causing contamination of exhibits or cross-contamination betwixt exhibits during their investigation

Contamination is a fact of life for investigators, and whatever criminal offense scene will take some level of contamination before the scene becomes an inactive result and the law can lock down the location. While issues of life and safety are at risk, the court volition have that some contamination is outside the control of the investigator. That tolerance for controlling contamination changes significantly once the crime scene is locked down and is nether control. Once the scene has been locked downward, crime scene management procedures must be put in identify. Crime scene contamination presents three challenges for investigators, namely:

1. Preventing contamination when possible,
2. Controlling ongoing contamination, and
3. Recording the known contamination that has taken place

In regards to the phrase "control ongoing contamination," the discussion "control" is used considering investigators cannot eliminate ongoing contagion, they can simply seek to control information technology. This exercise of identifying and recording the known contamination is necessary, and even if contagion has taken identify, identifying and explaining that contamination may salve the analysis of exhibits that have been contaminated.

During the critical period between the lockdown of the law-breaking scene and obtaining a warrant to search the crime scene, investigators demand to consider the possibilities for ongoing contamination. If reasonable grounds be to believe that prove of the criminal offense volition be damaged or destroyed past some threat of contamination, the investigator has the authority, nether exigent circumstances, to re-enter that crime scene without a warrant to take the necessary steps to stop or preclude contamination and protect the evidence.

The very act of entering the crime scene to collect evidence, and the process of evidence collection, are forms of contamination. The goal in controlling ongoing contamination is to avoid damaging the forensic integrity of the law-breaking scene and its associated exhibits. It is this goal that makes crime scene management procedures essential to the investigative process.

Loss of Continuity

Like controlling contamination, establishing and maintaining continuity of evidence are protocols that protect the integrity of that show. For any evidence to be accustomed by the courtroom, the estimate must be satisfied that the showroom presented is the aforementioned item that was taken from the criminal offense scene. Evidence must be presented to demonstrate "the concatenation of continuity," which tracks every showroom from the crime scene to the court.

The show to evidence continuity will come up from the investigator testifying that the showroom beingness presented is the same exhibit that was seized at the crime scene. This testimony is supported by the investigator showing the court their markings on the showroom or its container. These markings will include the fourth dimension, engagement, and investigator initials, also every bit a notebook entry showing the time, appointment, and place when the item was transported and locked away in the primary showroom property locker. This evidence is farther supported by an Exhibit Log that shows the showroom as role of the crime scene evidence detailing where at the crime scene information technology was found, by whom it was found, and the supporting initials of anyone else who handled that showroom from the criminal offence scene continuously to the main exhibit locker. Any process where that exhibit is removed from the main exhibit locker for test or analysis must exist similarly tracked and documented with the initials, fourth dimension, and engagement of any other handlers of the item. Whatever person who has handled the showroom must exist able to have the stand providing testimony that maintains the chain of continuity of the exhibit. These are elementary processes notwithstanding critical. If they are not followed rigorously, it can issue in the exclusion of exhibits based on lost continuity.

Attention to Originating Stages of Evidence

I of the big dilemmas in crime scene management is determining where the criminal event happened or where the consequence extended to. Making these determinations provides the investigator with the locations where evidence of the crime may be found. This is often not a simple matter of just attention one location or thinking about the criminal issue in only a single timeframe. In the investigative process, in that location are 3 possible stages of time where evidence can originate. These are the pre-crime stage, the criminal event stage, and the postal service-crime stage.

These iii stages of criminal offence can too mean there could exist other locations outside the immediately offense scene area where criminal activities might have besides taken place and evidence might be found. The point to remember most the originating stages of evidence is that each of these stages provides possibilities for collecting evidence that could connect the suspect to the criminal offense. When because theory evolution or making an investigative program, each of these stages of the criminal event should exist considered.

1. The Pre-Crime Phase occurs when evidence of preparation or planning can be plant during the investigation. It can include notes, research, drawings, crime supplies or pre-crime contact with the victim or accomplices. Sometimes items of pre-law-breaking origin, such every bit pilus and fibre, will be later discovered at the crime scene creating an opportunity to link the doubtable back to the law-breaking
2. The Criminal Upshot Stage is when the most interaction takes place between the criminal and the victim, or the criminal and the crime scene. During these interactions, the best possibilities for evidence transfer occur. Even the near careful criminals have been known to exit backside some trace of their identity in the form of fingerprints, shoe prints, glove prints, tire marks, tool impressions, beat out casings, hair or fibre, or DNA.
3. The Post-Criminal offence Stage occurs when the doubtable is departing the crime scene. When leaving the crime scene, suspects have been known to cast off items of prove that tin can be recovered and examined to constitute their identity. This post-criminal offense period is besides the stage where the suspect becomes concerned with cleaning upwards the scene. As much as a suspect may effort to make clean upwardly, evidence transfers from the crime scene are often overlooked. These can range from hair and fibre on clothing to shards of glass on shoes. Frequently institute post-law-breaking are gain of the criminal offense. These are ofttimes identifiable articles of stolen belongings with unique marks, victim Dna, serial numbers, or sometimes even trophies that the criminal takes equally a keepsake.

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Testify does not ever appear as a fully formed piece of data that offers an immediate connectedness or an inference to implicate a doubtable. It often comes together equally fragments of fact in timelines, spatial relationships, and testify transfers between the originating stages of evidence constructing circumstantial pictures to demonstrate the suspect'south identity, the fact pattern of the crime, opportunity, ways, or motive and intent.

Enhancing the Value of Testify Recovered

Pieces of physical evidence often referred to as exhibits, have investigative values at two different levels for investigators. At the first level each concrete exhibit has a confront value represented past what it is and where it exists inside the context of the criminal offence scene. For example a encarmine shoeprint constitute on the floor of a offense scene tells us that someone transferred evidence of blood onto their shoe from a source and walked in a particular direction within the criminal offence scene. These are first level interpretations of evidence that we can reconstruct with our own observations. At the 2nd level this same encarmine shoeprint may exist subjected to forensic examinations that could provide additional information. For example assay of the shoeprint pattern, size, and accidental characteristics may allow a positive match to the shoe of a doubtable, or the claret may exist examined to match the Deoxyribonucleic acid of a victim or other originating source. Both these first level and 2d level values can greatly assist in creating a reconstruction and interpretation of what happened at the crime scene.

Physical exhibits that demand to be examined, seized, and documented at any law-breaking scene are a major concern for investigators. As mentioned before, one of the big challenges for investigators is to place and document all of the bachelor evidence and information. This raises the important questions of what will become evidence and what is going to be important?

When the suspect and the fact-pattern are not immediately credible, how does an investigator determine which items within the crime scene need to be considered and taken as possible prove? There are some general practices that tin be followed, but a guiding principle of show collection followed by most experienced investigators is to err on the side of caution. More is e'er better than less. To assistance in deciding what could possibly become relevant, investigators need to consider:

• Items that the suspect may accept touched or interacted with
• Items that a victim may take touched or interacted with
• Items that the suspect may have brought to the crime scene
• Items that may have passed between the suspect and the victim
• Items that the suspect may have taken from the offense scene
• Items that the suspect may accept discarded while parting the crime scene

Once the offense scene test has been completed, and the law-breaking scene has been unsecured and abased as an open surface area, returning to collect forgotten evidence is oftentimes non possible. It is better to collect everything that could possibly be relevant or could become relevant.

In terms of searching for evidence, once the criminal offence scene has been locked down and secured, the crime scene itself needs to exist considered every bit the first big showroom. As the beginning large exhibit, it needs to exist subjected to documentation using photography, video recording, measurements, and diagrams. Within this first big exhibit, other smaller and possibly-related exhibit may be discovered. What items are found and where may evidence spatial relationships of interaction demonstrating proof to back up a sequence of events. This concrete evidence will become the criterion of known facts that investigators can use to verify the stories of victims and witnesses, or even the alibi of a possible suspect. Physical evidence at both level-one and level-two becomes the known facts upon which theories of events may be developed and tested. Whatever detail could exist considered evidence if it demonstrates a spatial human relationship relative to the identify, the people, or the times, relative to the criminal event.

The very first pace at this point is securing and documenting the criminal offense scene. It is helpful for investigators to recognize that a offense scene is not just a location where exhibits are found, but the criminal offence scene should be considered as a unmarried big exhibit unto itself. Not only will individual exhibits within the law-breaking scene have value as evidence, the spatial relationships betwixt exhibits in the scene may speak as circumstantial evidence to the overall result.

To secure the crime scene every bit the first big exhibit, investigators will behave a complete walk-through on the path of contamination completely photographing and videotaping the entire crime scene. This first process is very helpful in demonstrating the exact country of the crime scene prior to things beingness moved for forensic test. This should happen immediately after lock down and it will become a snapshot demonstrating the existing spatial relationships at that bespeak in time.

Creating a Field Sketch and Criminal offense Scene Diagram

The next step is to document the crime scene as either a field sketch or a crime scene diagram. Either of these tin can exist done to illustrate the concrete dimensions and notable characteristics of the criminal offense scene. The difference between the Field Sketch and the Crime Scene Diagram is that the sketch, equally implied by the proper name, is a quick rough delineation of the upshot. The field sketch, like notes in an investigator's notebook, serves equally a memory aid. The criminal offence scene diagram is a more formal representation of the aforementioned information, but is composed to scale using the assistance of the field sketch and measurements. In either of these drawings of the offense scene similar core information will be represented.

• If it is a building, it will prove the address of the location, entries, exits, windows, the position of rooms, the position of piece of furniture, and the location of all exhibits relative to the crime.
• In an outdoor criminal offence scene, establishing and documenting the location of the scene becomes more than complex. The geographic location of an outdoor scene needs to be established relative to some known geographic location, such as a roadway intersection, a mile-marker, or even by way of fixing of GPS coordinates of latitude and longitude to a permanent fixed object at the crime scene. In some cases, such as a large open up field, where no permanent stock-still objects are available, it may get necessary to place a fixed object like a steel survey pivot to mark a fixed point at the criminal offence scene.
• After the initial diagram features are completed and evidence is collected within the criminal offense scene, each of those exhibits will exist shown on the diagram with an exhibit number. That number volition be cross referenced to the exhibit log that will be completed by an assigned exhibit custodian equally part of the offense scene management team. This procedure of showing each exhibit equally a number eliminates the need to clutter the diagram with written description of each showroom plant. In some cases, where in that location are many exhibits, writing the description of each exhibit onto the diagram would brand it unreadable, chaotic, and confusing.
• In addition to existing features and bear witness at the criminal offence scene, the diagram will also bear witness the location of the path of contamination that has been established and the external perimeter of the criminal offence scene.
• As part of accepted protocols, these diagrams are always fatigued with an orientation to Northward at the acme of the diagram, and all writing on the diagram is oriented in i direction, namely due east to west

The Exhibit Log

As part of the evidence management process, establishing the first link in the chain of continuity occurs when the crime scene is secured and the assigned exhibit custodian records of the exhibits that have been identified at the scene is created. These items are recorded in a certificate chosen an "Exhibit Log" or an "Exhibit Ledger." This Showroom Log or Ledger shows an assigned number for each exhibit that is identified and seized. It shows where at the scene the exhibit was located, and the number of that exhibit is identify in the corresponding location in the criminal offence scene diagram.

The Exhibit Log shows who seized the showroom and when information technology was turned over to the exhibit custodian. The Exhibit Log also shows a time and appointment when the exhibit was placed into the principal secure exhibit storage locker. When the exhibits are taken to court, the courtroom will only accept the exhibits if the secured chain of continuity can be shown to exist guarded and unbroken. If an exhibit custodian were to stop and leave the exhibits unguarded in a vehicle or left the exhibit in the function while attending to another matter – that would break the concatenation of continuity. The following document is an example of a common Exhibit Log Document.

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Bear witness at a crime scene is generally found in 2 forms. 1 is prove of witnesses who can provide their observations of the criminal event. The other is physical items of evidence that can be examined, analyzed, and interpreted to illustrate facts most the criminal event. Each of these forms of testify nowadays some similar concerns for investigators, and each requires some specific considerations to best search for, collect, and preserve the information that exists.

Searching for Witness Evidence

Identifying and interviewing the witnesses to a criminal event can be as simple as speaking to persons who have remained at the scene of the crime to give statements. Alternately, information technology can be every bit difficult as identifying and tracking down a person who saw something or heard something that was role of the criminal event, but they are not even aware that what they saw or heard was important, or they do wish to cooperate with the police.

The procedure searching for witnesses starts at the criminal offence scene itself. This search will include not simply identifying and interviewing the persons who are immediately present, simply as well determining who else might accept been present during the pre-criminal offence and post-offense stages of the outcome.

• Oft, witnesses remaining at the crime scene can assist in identifying other witnesses who were present and have since departed.
• CCTV security cameras can sometimes assist in identifying other witnesses who were present.
• Identifying the vehicles parked in proximity to the crimes scene or returning to the law-breaking scene on subsequent days around the fourth dimension of the crime tin can assistance in identifying a witness whose normal course of activities may have previously put them in the area at the fourth dimension of the crime.

In addition to these witness search strategies, another procedure known as canvassing for witnesses can likewise be employed. Canvassing is a strategy of conducting door-to-door inquiries in the immediate area of the criminal offense to determine if annihilation was seen or heard by neighbours. Canvassing tin can also take the form of structured media releases to request persons with noesis of the criminal effect to come up forward. Whatever witness identification strategies are used, fourth dimension is of the essence. Memories fade and people under normal circumstances merely retain day-to-day recollection of unremarkable events for a limited time. Identifying and speaking to the witness, and receiving their best recollection of the events, will be discussed in the affiliate on witness management; still, witness evidence can make or break the investigation, and it must exist collected rapidly, accurately, and effectively.

Searching for and Identifying Physical Show

Earlier in this volume, we described concrete prove as the buried treasure for investigators and critical when it comes to verifying or discounting various versions of an event in court. Physical evidence is something tangible that the court tin examine and consider in making connections and determining proof beyond a reasonable doubt. In contrast, witness testify does non have a physical quality that the court can notice. Information technology requires the court to accept the perception and interpretation of events being provided by a person and, as such, the court cannot evaluate witness evidence with the same conviction of verification that information technology uses when considering concrete evidence.

In our sub-department on Originating Stages of Bear witness, we looked at the timeframes and alternate crime scene venues where evidence of a crime may be plant. Now, nosotros are going to consider the physical evidence that investigators should retrieve about when evaluating what might constitute an item of physical evidence. We will consider how bear witness can be searched for, how it should exist collected, when it should be collected, and how it should be preserved. These processes present several challenges:

1. Physical evidence tin can be transient or time sensitive. As part of the big picture search in the first instance, the investigator must be conscious of physical bear witness that needs to be immediately recorded and documented.
2. Physical show can be curtained and may not exist hands visible. Walking onto a crime scene in the first instance, it would exist unrealistic for an investigator to believe they will immediately see all the physical evidence that needs to be collected. Items of physical evidence can exist in many forms and discovering their existence is a affair of careful examination of the entire scene. The idea of conducting a big pic search starting time allows the investigator to not only discover the immediately apparent items, but also for a survey of the crime scene to decide areas where the small scale and more detailed search might be productive.
   • Doors and windows: open, locked, or unlock tin can be relevant to time and means of entry or exit from the scene
   • Condition of room lighting: turned on or off tin can propose the lighting weather at the time of the crime
   • Status of appliances in use at the scene can indicate certain activities
   • Concluding activation of electronic devices can narrow timelines of activity
   • Ambient criminal offence scene temperature and torso temperature can exist relevant in relation to time of death and the progress rigor mortis or decomposition
3. The immediate value of an item may not be visible at first glance. Moving from the big movie search to place items in the smaller scale search, investigators tin can conduct a detailed grid search of the crime scene to locate items that may be very small or are curtained by other objects. These filigree searches can be useful in breaking downwardly the crime scene into smaller search areas to make sure that no area goes unexamined. Along with this detailed search for small or concealed items, the investigator needs to consider enlisting the assistance of forensic specialists to search for items that may require enhanced test and assay beyond the bounds of regular homo senses and perception. For instance, the use of black low-cal can reveal body fluid or stains, and latent fingerprints tin can become visible later on fuming or the application of special powder. In most major criminal cases, forensic specialists will be bachelor to assist in conducting the detailed crime scene search. Every investigator must exist good in recognizing when to utilize of these forensic tools.
4. The size or nature of an item of evidence may make it impossible to seize or preserve. Amid the challenges of gathering evidence at a offense scene are:
   • Some exhibits are besides big to exist physically seized and brought to court. As previously noted, the entire crime scene and the inherent spatial relationships of objects inside that scene could exist considered as one large exhibit that needs to be shown to the court. This large offense scene showroom is captured and can exist presented to the court by style of video recording, photographs, crime scene diagram, or using a sample of smaller exhibits inside the scene itself.
   • Some exhibits are perishable and impractical to seize and preserve for court. A skilful example would be the bear witness of the dead trunk in a murder case. The body itself would be impractical to bring to court. It is considered acceptable to have photographic testify and certificates of assay on pathology samples.
   • Some exhibits are transient in nature and cannot be permanently seized and preserved for court. For example, ambient room temperature or lighting condition at the crime scene needs to be preserved by photographs and measurements in that moment of time and subsequently presented to the courtroom as photographs and readings by the attending investigator.
5. The drove of certain show tin can crusade cross-contamination to other exhibits. A major consideration in the collection of any testify at a crime scene is to ensure that evidence with whatever potential for cantankerous-contamination is handled in a manner that takes precautions confronting this occurring. In most cases, at major law-breaking scenes, physical evidence is collected by forensic experts. However, this does non prevent the need for investigators to understand the dangers of cross-contagion and the precautions required to preclude it. This is specially true when it comes to the collection of bodily substances where DNA might be nerveless. DNA analysis is at present so advanced that fifty-fifty a small trace of DNA material can be transferred by the careless or inadvertent handling of one exhibit to the next. This cantankerous-contagion can be avoided or prevented past the practice of handling only 1 exhibit at a time, marking that exhibit, placing into a secure container, and decontaminating the investigator past changing gloves and discarding whatsoever item could have come into contact with the previous exhibit. Despite the balls that forensic specialists volition normally attend a law-breaking scene for bear witness drove, it is possible that an investigator at the scene will be forced to handle a number of exhibits to protect that evidence from some type of ecology impairment or other security threat.

Topic 4: Scaling the Investigation to the Outcome

Not every crime scene is a major event that requires an investigator to call out a team and undertake the crime scene and evidence management processes that have been described in this book. Oft, for minor crimes, a single investigator will be lone at the crime scene and will engage in all the roles described, albeit on a far smaller scale. When this process is being undertaken by a single investigator on a smaller scale, the problems of diagram, security log, and exhibit log may exist limited to data and illustrations in the notebook of the investigator.

It is of import to stress that each of the tasks beneath needs to be considered and addressed for every crime scene investigation, no matter how big or how modest. Specifically:

• The crime scene must be secured, preserved, and recorded until prove is nerveless
• Existing contagion must be considered and recorded
• Cantankerous-contagion must be prevented
• Exhibits must be identified, preserved, nerveless, and secured to preserve the chain of continuity.

Big scale or small-scale calibration, all these problems must be considered, addressed, and recorded to satisfy the court that the offense scene and the prove were handled correctly.

Summary

In this affiliate, we accept discussed the critical issues of criminal offense scene management, evidence identification, testify location, show drove, testify protection, and proper documentation. These are the most of import skills that an investigator can learn and incorporate into their investigative toolkit. Equally much every bit these tasks may seem simplistic, ritualistic, and mundane, they are the very foundation of a criminal investigation, and without this foundation of proper evidence practices in place, the case will plummet when it comes to court.

There is a great opportunity on a twenty-four hour period-to-twenty-four hours basis for new investigators to begin practicing the protocols of crime scene management on a smaller scale investigating crimes such equally break and entry and lower level assaults. Once these skills of crime scene management and evidence management are learned and incorporated into daily practice, they will become the procedural norm and volition form the essential operational habits for proper and professional person investigative practice.

Long Descriptions

Criminal offense scene security log long clarification: A bare criminal offence scene security log. Information technology has spaces to write down the name of the assigned scene security officer, the date, the police section investigating the scene, the file number, and the crime scene location. It also has a tabular array with several rows to record everyone who has attended the criminal offence scene. The table has spaces for proper name and rank, initials, engagement/time in, date/time out, duties on criminal offense scene, and contamination acquired. [Return to Criminal offence scene security log]

The originating stages of evidence long description: A chart showing what happens at the different originating stages of evidence. The three stages are:

• Pre-offense stage
  • Planning
  • Notes
  • Research
  • Criminal offence supplies
• Criminal event stage
  • Most transfer of physical show
  • Suspect to Victim
  • Victim to Suspect
  • Doubtable to Scene
• Mail service-crime stage
  • Fugitive anticipation
  • Casts-off evidence
  • Evidence of clean-upwardly
  • Transfer takeaway
  • Gain of the criminal offense

[Render to The originating stages of prove]

Exhibit log long description: A sample exhibit log. There is room to write the proper name of the assigned exhibit custodian, the date, the file number, and the location. In that location is a table with several rows for writing about the exhibits from a law-breaking scene. At that place are spaces for the exhibit number, description, who the exhibit was seized by, the engagement/fourth dimension, the location, when the exhibit was turned over to the exhibit custodian, and the date/time secured. [Return to Showroom log]

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