Once Every 4 Years...

I felt like I should post today, as it's February 29... Will I still be blogging in 4 years? Who knows, as I am barely doing it now! It's funny how life works...

More quotes from your favorite forensic scientist

The following are quotes from our favorite forensic scientist, unless noted:

"You should all go to court." Student: "What do you suggest we go to court for?"

Pointing to an image of a gun: "You'd rather be at this end [the stock] than at this end [muzzle]. This end will hurt!"

"I am on record in State Courts having to explain why I was giggling while talking to the jury about semen."

On the cleanliness of hotel rooms: "I wouldn't take a polylight to a hotel room, unless you want to go [makes disgusted face] "eww!" "Eww!""

"You've got to take your hunger break when you're killing someone."

"Yes, I have found myself in some of my crime scene samples before..."

Explaining that urine in an excellent source of DNA evidence: "Guys, you should never write your name in the snow if you're going to commit a crime..."

Pass it on...

My illustrious, blog-hopping brother posed the following (well, it was posed to him, and he was good enough to share...):

1. Sum up your blogging motivation, philosophy and experience in exactly 10 words.

Now, unlike him, I will not write a long answer to this and then sum it up in 10 words. Anybody could do that! I will instead tackle the problem directly. So here it is:

I blog because I am not witty enough to tweet!

Photos from the Mock Crime Scene

Sorry it took so long, but here are a few pictures from our mock crime scene. Enjoy!

Another email with the forensic scientist...

"I don't remember if I told you much about the mock scene, but it's based on a crime scene we worked back in about '03 where a guy was beaten, stabbed and shot (we discovered that later...great story I can tell you later). The mock scene, however, only involves the beating and stabbing. It should be a pretty easy scene to lay out. It will require a little bit of clean up afterward, but don't they all! We have all the things here to lay out the scene, including the body, so I'll figure out about how long it'll take me to get the scene laid out, with some help from a couple of you, and we can plan from there on."

Love it!

Life lessons from a forensic scientist...

As promised, here are some life lessons from my favorite forensic scientist (as shared with our students).

Revenge:
"... don't pee on someone's jacket, it's just not nice"

Career choices:
"... if you work in forensics, it helps if you have a perverse sense of humor"

Being a criminal:
"... being a criminal is a hungry business"
"... if you're breaking into a house, remember to take your clothes with you"

Lawyers:
"There are some prosecutors that I wonder "how did they make it through law school... and how are they still breathing?""

Carrying a fire-arm:
"I get 10 bullets... 5 to shoot at the suspect, and 5 to shoot while running away"

The call of nature:
"I love our new crime scene truck. It has a toilet!"
"... if you've got to go, and there's no where that you can go... it gets painful!"

Job perks:
"... I got to drive 100 mph down the highway... it was awesome!"
"... this was the first time I had to swab blood from feces"

Crime scene equipment:
"... you never know when you'll need a shovel"
"There are two ends to a measuring tape, the smart end and the dumb end... I prefer the dumb end"

Student: "Why do so many people need to be contacted to send a forensic unit to a crime scene?"
Forensic Scientist: "That's a really good question... people need to justify their jobs"

The great outdoors:
"... me, I'm one of those weird people, I don't mind the smell of skunk"

Hygiene:
"... in your lifetime, you should throw your shoes away."
"I had a buddy who ran over a bloated possum once. . couldn't get the stink off for weeks"

How to be an effective criminal:
"... a gunshot to the head is more likely to produce blowback than one to the abdomen... especially if its a fat guy"
"... if you're going to injure someone, don't do it on carpet"
"If you break into someone's house. .. take the chicken leg with you"

Tips on being a victim:
"If you're getting beat up, make sure to throw out a contact lens."
". . you don't want to come across my desk."

Random facts:
"...there's a lot of blood in a 300lb man"
"It would take 7.2 trillion sperm to reach from here to the moon"

Did I mention that I loved my job...?

I have been trying to organize a mock crime scene for one of our classes during the summer. We have a friend in the state bureau of investigation who has been helping me, and here is a quote from one of his emails:

"Do you have any idea what kind of scene you might want, or do you just want whatever? Shooting, stabbing, beating, strangulation? A combination of a few or all? We've had scenes before where the victim was shot, stabbed and beaten. We've even had one where the guy was shot, dismembered, burned (not completely though), then dumped in a well. I'm thinking you probably would want to keep it to a basic shooting, stabbing, or beating, but not necessarily all three."

I love forensics people...