Glass Fragments

Tanner having trouble tying
the knot over the glass

The smell! THE SMELL!!!!

Cool, laser beam

Broken glass...

Breaking glass

I guess that today's lab was the most fun that we've had so far. We were breaking glass and studying their feature. We used a hammer and nail to shatter the glass, and a lot of us had quite a bit of trouble breaking the glass. I guess that I can say proudly that I succeeded on the first attempt, and some other people were hitting the nail too soft, afraid to break their fingers instead it frustrated me a lot to see people hammering at the glass for minutes over and over again... made it sound like a construction site. Then we went through some procedures to find out the density of the glass, and dipped it into distilled water, vegetable oil, and clove oil (which gave off a disgusting odor), to see if the density of the glass shard match that of the oil's. We then directed a laser pointer at 30 degrees flat on the desk at a semicircle container of the oil, and found the rate of refraction. All of this is to determine where the shard of glass came from.

Ballistics... Firearms and Tool Marks

After the last reading quiz of the winterim course (yay), we set off to the BCII (Beau of Criminal Identification and Investigation).

We mainly talked about the examination of firearms, matching the bullets to the gun, determining the distance of which the gun is fired, and things like that. We went to the labatory for firearm examination, and saw the water tank for test firing, and it was pretty amazing to think that it was able to stop a bullet and keep it intact with just water in it. There was another wall made out of recycled tires (amazing thought) that was also made to stop and preserve bullets for comparison. It seems that every different gun makes a mark on the bullet that is unique to itself, and it can be identified.

We also took a tour through the other labs, including DNA, fingerprints, photograph, and drugs (and here we saw another set of gas chromotagraphy machines for determining the components in samples, we saw some at the police department, and another at the coroners' office).

Visit to the Courthouse

Walkin' in the rain

In the courtroom

Through the security check

In the courtroom

Today didn't start out too well, as we were made to walk in the rain for a while, and not every one of us had a umbrella, not a lot of us had a jacket with us, even. Other than that, the morning was pretty resourceful. We were at the Lucus County Courtroom, we went to the prosecutor's office, and we talked about some cases involving DNA analysis. Then we went to the courtroom and talked a bit about some cases and how things worked out in there.

Trevor obviously enjoying
the food

In the courtroom

We had lunch at the buffet, and some of us (*cough*) enjoyed themselves (very much).

Soil Evidence

The lab we did today was a little bit confusing. We were looking at the soil samples with the naked eye, with UV lights, and under microscopes. The heating of the soil didn't result in anything (as far as we could see), and I can't really make anything out of it except when we used the UV lights and found fluorescent particles within some of the soil. I could also see where everything was headed when we try to find the acidity of the soil with the universal indicator, the result was pretty obvious when one turned red (indicating that it is a acid), and some turned green (indicating that it is neutral). The chemical reaction part didn't work out too well either, as all we saw was the change in color which is meant to happen. The density check for the soil was pretty obvious though, even if though it didn't result anything (-.-).

Fourth Day - Trip to Police Station

Police station might not be a pleasing place to be in for some people, but for students like us, it was a fascinating trip. We split up into groups and went off to see different parts of a crime investigation. 


Our group first went to the basement to see the polygraph (a.k.a. lie detector). We went through how exactly does the polygraph works. There were two rubber tubes that go around the chest and stomach that registers the respiration, two probes that are attached to the fingers to measure the electricity conductivity of the skin, and also a strap to the arm to measure the blood pressure. All those sensors are meant to measure the involuntary reactions of the human body in reaction to stress. 


After that we went to a office to look at how the police use the laser (Light Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation). It can detect illuminations emitted by some fingerprints, special fibers, drugs, and hairs including human and animals. 


We also went to see the forensics lab at the police station, it had a firearms examination, where they compare the different bullets and match them with guns. The other section was the drugs inspection, and how they inspect what is in the drugs.

Toxicology

From yesterday: After finishing blogging yesterday, we went to the coroner's office. We took a tour there and saw some labs. We went through the freeze room, with the bodies, and it had a sickening odor to it. Someone said that it was the "smell of death". We went through the toxicology lab, got a sense of what how everything works, and that is what we did today.

TOXICOLOGY

In today's lab, we got to handle some pretty colorful stuff. Lots of acids and bases, and a little bit of heavy metal. We went over tests with all sorts of drugs and heavy metal and some urine (of course, most of which are simulated). There were some colorful results from the reactions, and a little bit of bubbles. It gave me some sort of an idea how everything was done in toxicology labs.

Second Day...

Our Fingerprints

Iodine Dustless Fingerprints

Today's lab was somewhat more interesting than yesterday's (in my opinion at least). We got to do a lot of fingerprints, and it actually looked as if our whole class was a huge group of wanted criminals being caught and recording fingerprints, and it was pretty interesting how many ways you can look for fingerprints. The thing is, the first one that we worked on, we grabbed a soda can, and put it on a piece of aluminum foil and covered it with a cardboard box, we slipped a cartridge of super glue in there. We finished it first thing in the morning, yet when we checked on it just before lunch, none of us got anything interesting, and it was very disappointing. We tried several other different ways to cover fingerprints, all of which are interesting, and we each made a card of all ten of our fingers, and taped them onto the white board.

Before lunch we saw a video about the work of medical examiners after some dead people committed suicide and it was interesting and somewhat disgusting. It kept talking about opening up the body, weighing the organs, and cutting open the skull to take the brain out. Ew.

The Sherlock Holmes game was very disappointing though, because we cannot figure out how to save everything, so I guess we would have to start all over again tomorrow.