LIsa Black
Cape Coral, FL
Female, 49
I spent the five happiest years of my life in a morgue. As a forensic scientist in the Cleveland coroner’s office I analyzed gunshot residue on hands and clothing, hairs, fibers, paint, glass, DNA, blood and many other forms of trace evidence, as well as crime scenes. Now I'm a certified latent print examiner and CSI for a police department in Florida. I also write a series of forensic suspense novels, turning the day job into fiction. My books have been translated into six languages.
That's an excellent question that unfortunately I can't answer. One probably would use it, but back when I did hairs and fibers it was generally thought that the only way was to extract the dye and do thin-layer chromatography, which we didn't have. We also didn't have a Ramen, so all I could do was microscopic comparison.
Best of luck!
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I don't believe so, but I haven't done DNA analysis in 20 years so I'm not the best person to ask. I know there's an amylase test for saliva, but I don't know if it's used any more. And if you have a mixture I doubt it would be possible to tell what DNA is from what bodily fluid.
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I don’t know what you mean by pure math. Most crime scene work, fingerprints, tool marks, serology, might need regular adding and subtracting, but I don’t know of any field that uses calculus or algebra. DNA analysis uses a lot of statistics and ballistics and traffic accident investigation might use physics and geometry. But those are the only examples I can think of.
Best of luck!
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I don’t really know, but at the coroner’s office I worked at I was told that our coroner was actually the highest law enforcement officer, technically, in the county. She was the only person who could arrest the sheriff if necessary. That never became necessary though so I don’t know how it would actually work.
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I haven’t ever done an autopsy at all, since I’m not a pathologist. They can be done on animals, usually it’s called a necropsy and may be done by a veterinarian.
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Interesting idea, but again I don't know. I don't know what liquid is used for the tests, so that might affect things.
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No, we have lots of paperwork. Lots.
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