India to help Maldives with forensic lab, training

ndia Wednesday assured a visiting Maldives delegation of help the Indian Ocean nation in setting up a police academy, forensic science laboratory, corporate fraud cell and as also train its officers in investigating cyber crime and economic offences.

The delegation, led by Home Minister Mohamed Shihab Shihab and including Commissioner of Police Ahmed Faseeh and Deputy Head of Strategic Development Department Yoonus Sobah, visited the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) headquarters and the Central Forensic Science Laboratory (CFSL) here.

It also visited the DNA lab, computer forensics and voice spectrograph division, ballistics division and lie-detection division in the CFSL.

Source:
http://www.in.com/news/current-affairs/fullstory-india-to-help-maldives-with-forensic-lab-training-12664711-c9f1391004c13d2aa8e681b543a45ab68fc43d34-1.html

Government appoints team to examine state of forensic science- February 1,2010

New Delhi: In an initiative to improve the state of forensic science in the country, the home ministry has appointed a two-member team of consultants to examine the facilities of training and condition of laboratories.

Addressing his monthly press conference, home minister P Chidambaram today said state of forensic science as well as the state of the Central and State Forensic Science Laboratories "leave much to be desired" hence the year 2010 has been declared as the "Year of Forensic Science".

SOURCE: DNA Article: http://www.dnaindia.com/india/report_government-appoints-team-to-examine-state-of-forensic-science_1341982#share

Medico-Legal Update

Medico-legal Update is an international journal which bring latest knowledge regarding changing medico legal scenario to its readers. The journal caters to specialties of Forensic Medicine, Forensic Science, D.N.A. fingerprinting, Toxicology, Environment hazards, Sexual Medicine etc. The journal has been assigned international standard serial number (ISSN) 0971-720X. The journal is registered with Registrar of Newspapers for India vide registration numbers 63757/96 under Press and Registration of Books act,1867. The journal is abstracted by Sociological Abstracts, San Diego (U.S.A.) The journal is also covered with EMBASE [Excerpta Medica Data Base] from 1997. The Journal is also cited by INDEX COPERNICUS, Poland.
"The first issue of Medico-Legal Update was published in 1996"


Visit their site: http://www.medicolegalupdate.org/index.html
for more details

Crime wave fuels forensics boom in Mexico

Enrique Ramos slipped a long piece of packing tape into a bowl of purple dye, swished it around and then held it up to a light, looking for fingerprints.
"They use this tape for packaging drugs or for tying you up before they put a bullet in your head," he told a group of forensic science students clustered around him. "You get great fingerprints off it."

As Mexico struggles to stem a wave of drug-related crime, forensic science classes such as Ramos' are multiplying, trying to meet the booming demand for fingerprint collectors, crime scene photographers and ballistics experts to keep up with the body count.

"Forensic science is seeing a boom in Mexico," said Rafael Ruíz Mena, secretary-general for professional training at Mexico's National Institute of Criminal Science. "More and more young people are seeing this as a career opportunity."

Source: http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2010-01-12-mexico-crime_N.htm

New Rule Allows Use of Partial DNA Matches

ALBANY — New York has become the latest of a handful of jurisdictions to permit a controversial use of DNA evidence that gives law enforcement authorities a sophisticated means to track down criminals.

Under a state rule approved in December, DNA found at a crime scene that does not exactly match that of someone in the state’s DNA database can still be used to pursue suspects if the DNA closely resembles that of someone on file.

Since family members share genetic traits, a partial DNA match allows investigators to narrow searches to relatives of people whose DNA is already in the state database, forensic experts say.

But advocates for protecting the public’s privacy warned that the practice could be abused and effectively promoted a guilt-by-association approach to criminal justice that could result in the investigation of many innocent people. New York’s DNA database contains more than 343,000 genetic profiles of people convicted of serious crimes.

As DNA databases have grown and investigators have become more sophisticated about recovering genetic evidence from every possible source at a crime scene, partial matches have become a tantalizing policing tool.

Source:
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/25/nyregion/25dna.html

Virtual Forensic Computing (VFC) by MD5 Ltd, UK

VFC is one of the significant breakthrough's in forensic computing in the last ten years. VFC enables investigators to:

rapidly boot a forensic image of a suspects computer; or
boot a physical write blocked hard drive.
The investigator can then experience the 'desktop' as seen by the original user in an entirely forensic manner. The investigator can use the suspects computer in a read only virtual environment.

"VFC boots a mounted EnCase image in seconds..."

There are numerous specialist software applications available to assist the investigation and analysis of digital media which has been forensically acquired. Whilst these tools can and do provide a great depth of analysis and will reveal data fragments of material no longer readily available, it is often the case that the 'scene of the crime' part of the examination process is overlooked as an additional source of potentially invaluable information.

In the 'real' world, it is almost unthinkable not to examine in detail the actual crime scene and then perform 'forensic' examinations on evidence gathered from the scene. In the 'virtual' world of forensic Computing, the same is not true and all too often it is only the underlying data and information that resides on the storage devices that is examined in detail.

Source: http://www.mountimage.com/virtual-forensic-computing-vfc.php

Can Digital Tech and Insects Replace Cadaver-Sniffing Dogs?

Forensic scientists work with law enforcement to locate and identify corpses at crime scenes and in the wake of disasters. Forensic teams typically rely on highly trained cadaver dogs that are expensive to maintain. DNA or dental records are then used to determine a recovered body’s identity. Although these well-honed methods are considered the gold standard, forensic experts are faced with scenarios where these conventional tools are impractical, as when the body is badly decomposed or buried by debris. These new tools are being developed.

Source: Popular Mechanics

http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/worst_case_scenarios/4338265.html?nav=RSS20&src=syn&dom=yah_buzz&mag=pop