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 would depend entirely on the circumstances and method of murder, wouldn't it? If they are such that it would be impossible for the person to have died by accident, suicide, or of natural causes, then murder would be suspected.
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First of all, no teacher should ever tell you you're 'not smart enough' for a field.
Second, not all forensic work involves a great deal of biology--really only DNA analysis and serology do. Toxicology will require a good chemistry background. But specialized fields such as latent prints, crime scene investigator, questioned documents, digital evidence, ballistics and impression evidence would use little to no biology.
If a formal degree becomes a problem, you might want to see if you can start out in an Evidence/Property area and work up from there.
Best of luck!
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Was she washed up out of the water or found on a dock or something? In the first case it wouldn't be interpretable because you can't know where the body was when rigor set in. In the second it might indicate that the body had been moved if the hand position wasn't consistent with where the body was found. I don't know what you mean by 'refreshness'. Stomach contents can help a pathologist estimate how long it had been between eating and time of death, though of course everyone's digestion rate is a little different. I hope that helps!
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Well, you could simply say you're going to be an anthropologist, which is true--I believe you'd have to be an anthropologist first and then specialize in forensic work. They might be disapproving because they believe it will be difficult to get a job--which is probably also true. When I was at the coroner's office our anthropologist was a college professor who would drive two hours to come and consult whenever we had skeletal remains. Very few agencies are large enough to have a full-time anthropologist on staff. So you might want to have some sort of back-up plan.
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That depends on what you want to go into. If you want toxicology, go with chemistry. If you want serology or DNA, go with biology. If crime scene, general forensic science.
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They might. I couldn't say for sure one way or the other.
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Yes. It's not common, but prints have been lifted using superglue or the more recent RTX. The best areas would be those that are smooth, clean and largely free of hair.
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