Ask a Forensic Scientist anything

989 Questions

Last Answer on July 21, 2022

If a attacker OC sprayed someone and robbed them is there chemical tests to see if the spray that was on the victims face and the Pepper spray on the suspect to see who did it

Asked by Question about 5 years ago

That’s a good question that I’m afraid I can’t answer. I’m sure there is some way to determine the chemicals used in pepper spray. But this would be affected by a) how long does it remain on the skin before the skin absorbs it and b) most forensic chemistry labs are set up to detect illegal drugs in urine, blood or gastric contents. Identifying any kind of poison or other substance may require equipment or reference databases they don’t have.

Proving it’s the same batch of pepper spray may or may not be possible. I”m not personally involved in this kind of testing, but I can assure you it is not like television. We had a series of cases and wanted to determine the exact composition of drugs with percentages of fentanyl, heroin etc. Turned out while nearly every crime lab can determine if a drug is present, there were only one or two labs in the entire country we could find that could determine percentages, and they charged an arm and a leg.

Sorry I can’t be more help.

389 Votes

What are the top 10 most fun/ interesting facts about your job?

Asked by Miki23 about 5 years ago

Wow, that’s a tough question! I’m not sure I could come up with ten.

388 Votes

So you wanna be a Forensic Scientist?

Check our Jobstr's career page for salary information, educational requirements, suggested reading and more!

What work do you do on a daily basis?

Asked by Janessa Dillon over 4 years ago

At my department I mostly work with fingerprints, analyzing and comparing fingerprints that I collect off pieces of evidence or pick up at crime scenes or ones that the officers submit after they collect them at crime scenes. I will also go to crime scenes, photograph, collect prints, items of evidence, maybe test for blood or collect samples of blood with sterile swabs. There’s also a lot of time spent writing up all this information in our reports and other paperwork. If I worked in DNA or ballistics or toxicology, I would probably spend all day in the lab doing those types of analysis. So it depends on where you work, what services they provide, and what your exact position is. I hope that helps!

388 Votes

I hear there is a lot of politics in police work is this true and why?

Asked by Bobbi sue over 5 years ago

Before I worked in forensics, I was a personnel secretary, a hotel maid, and an ice cream counter server and a gas station 'full service specialist'. My husband is an elevator field engineer. There is 'politics' in every profession. Every. Single. One.

Best of luck!

388 Votes

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At a postmortem crime scene where hair has fallen out from the victim, over time, is all the loose hair collected for evidence or just some of it

Asked by Leesa about 5 years ago

That would depend a great deal on the circumstances. Any hair actually on the victim that does not appear to belong to the victim would likely be collected. If there was obviously a struggle, if the victim was beaten or strangled, hairs on their hands or caught in their fingers would warrant special attention or any clumps of hair nearby. If the victim's lying on a carpet that apparently hasn't been vacuumed for the past decade, then single hairs might be disregarded. If the person is outside and shot from a distance, then hairs would likely be disregarded.

I hope that helps!

387 Votes