Scene of the Crime Read Online Free PDF

trainer may help to control the scene.
    • Dog may help to capture perp who is resisting arrest.
    • Dog may sniff out drugs.
    • Dog may sniff out explosives.
    • Trainer testifies in court as necessary.
    Secretary—
    • Types and files reports dictated by officers.
    • Types search warrants and arrest warrants, under direction of officers.
    • Types and files written statements of witnesses, victims and perps, under direction of officers.
    • Helps keep witnesses calm while statements are being taken.
    • Deals with telephone and face-to-face inquiries from reporters, relatives and other interested persons.
    • Testifies in court as necessary.
    Crime-Laboratory Technician—
    • May go to scene if crime is unusually serious.
    • Receives evidence from crime-scene technician, maintaining proper chain of custody.
    • Keeps evidence legally secure.
    • Performs necessary chemical, radiological and/or microscopic examination of physical evidence.
    • Makes detailed report to jurisdiction(s) involved with case.
    • Testifies in court as necessary.
    Records Division —
    • Maintains mug shots and arrest records of all people arrested.
    • Maintains copies of all initial and subsequent crime and accident reports, making them available to appropriate people including victims and their families, insurance companies, and officers from other jurisdictions.
    • Makes out intake sheet on all arrestees.
    • Fingerprints and photographs all arrestees.
    • Microfilms old files so that the paper files can be placed in
    long-range storage or discarded.
    • Testifies in court as necessary.
    • Keeps track of disposition of cases, so that records remain up to date.
    District Attorney—
    • Coordinates with investigating officers to be certain warrants are not taken before the case is adequately investigated.
    • May provide additional investigators to work with police investigators to ensure that all legalities are dealt with appropriately.
    • Prepares and presents case in court.
    Be aware that not all jurisdictions have all of these positions, and that some of the names may differ from place to place. A person who investigates a crime may be called a detective or an investigator; that person may carry the rank of patrol officer first class or lieutenant, and the office that person works in may be called the Detective Division, the Detective Bureau or the Investigative Section. A person who goes to the crime scene for the purpose of taking photographs and measurements, sketching and fingerprinting may be called an identification officer, an identification technician or a scene-of-crimes officer.
    As a writer, you have the responsibility of checking with the appropriate police department, district attorney's office, sheriffs department, or whatever to determine precisely what is done in the kind of department you are writing about.
    Failing to look into these matters can result in your looking extremely stupid—in print.
    Dr. Hans Gross, professor of criminology at the University of Prague, has the distinction of having written the very first book of criminology that was a major influence in the Western world. Originally titled Handbuch fur Untersuchungsrichter als System der Krimi-nalistik (A Handbook on the Criminal Sciences for Examining Magistrates) and published in the last quarter of the nineteenth century, it went through countless translations and new editions; the 1934 English translation of the third edition, which I quote here, was a very late version. Although almost everything in it is now outdated and superseded, it is still well worth reading because it was the first solid attempt to systemize investigation and turn it into a science.
    The situation Gross describes in the preceding passage has not changed in the slightest. Some of the unlikely places my friends and I have found evidence include a hole in the outside wall of a house on the escape route of a robber, a