Bodily Fluids As Evidence

Catalog description

This course covers the value of body fluids found at the crime scene, the interpretation of their patterns, and methods used to locate them. The successful student will understand the science of blood stain interpretation; presumptive testing of seminal fluid and blood; the various flight characteristics of blood and the use of trigonometry to determine angles of impact and the origin of stain patterns; the chemicals associated with the location of visible and invisible stain patterns produced from body fluids; the chemical reactions associated with these and other chemicals used in connection with body fluid processing; the scientific limitations relevant to courtroom testimony on such topics as blood stain interpretation, antigen-antibody reactions, presumptive blood and presumptive seminal fluid testing; and the history of DNA analysis and its modern day evidentiary value.