Course Overview
A successful investigation culminating in conviction(s) in a court of law often begins at the crime scene, the processing of which is conducted by highly trained professionals. The purpose of this crime scene investigation course is to teach some of the fundamental aspects of scene processing to a standard expected by the policing community. As such, this course covers the major areas of crime scene management providing an understanding of the employment of appropriate scene preservation and documentation methodologies.
Prerequisite(s)
- Admission to a Forensic credential program or permission of the Program Coordinator.
Credits
3.0
- Not offered this term
- This course is not offered this term. Notify me to receive email notifications when the course opens for registration next term.
Learning Outcomes
At the end of the course,the student will be able to:
- Assess a crime scene in order to determine the scene management techniques required:
- Assess whether, in a given set of circumstances, the scene is appropriately delineated.
- Instruct a crime scene guard as to what his/her actions should be to safe guard the scene integrity.
- Given a set of circumstances, evaluate whether it is appropriate to enter a simulated crime scene:
- Justify entry based on legal authority.
- Justify the exclusion of certain personnel.
- Combine the various types of crime scene photography in order to properly document a simulated crime scene:
- Select appropriate photographic techniques based on the specific challenges presented.
- Generate a set of photographs that illustrates the scene as you found it, as well as in the various states of processing.
- Plan the taking of photographs such that the context is clearly illustrated.
- Create a forensic crime scene video suitable for presentation in court:
- Plan the direction of pans and the order of video captures such that coverage is complete and in a logical order.
- Construct a final presentation based on raw footage acquired in the execution of the plan developed in 4.1.
- Generate a scale drawing based on observations recorded in a rough sketch:
- Differentiate between relevant and non-relevant features.
- Select a final scale that optimizes drawing area available.
- Prepare a final plan drawing of crime scene based establish standards.
Effective as of Fall 2008
Programs and courses are subject to change without notice. Find out more about BCIT course cancellations.