Forensic Science News

As the mock victim awaits the investigator’s attention, student points out evidence in the murder scene for another student to photograph.

After spending years processing mock murders in the cramped confines of a small storage room inside Filley Hall, forensic science students at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln are now getting to stretch their crime scene investigation skills at the Crime Scene House on East Campus.

It’s a game-changer for the students, said Michael Adamowicz, director of the forensic science program, and Larry Barksdale, assistant professor of practice with the program. Previously, students had to work in teams of two in the small room processing the mock crime scene for the forensic science capstone course held each spring. With the interior of a house now available, the whole crew can work together, creating an atmosphere much more akin to real life.

“It’s an immersive experience and very similar to what they’ll be doing in the future,” Adamowicz said. “The students can all get in at once and work as a team. It makes everything run more efficiently and it’s saved us time.”

Barksdale said he was able to make the scene more complex with more room, draw in the whole property for processing and make accommodations for the sometimes unpredictable Nebraska weather.

“There’s a lot more places to look,” said Barksdale, a retired Lincoln Police detective. “We’ve been able to include the car in the case. We’ve put fingerprints on the windows outside to process. They’ll be doing 3D scanning of the entire house. Another benefit, I think, of the house is that we can now work with the weather. We can do outside techniques, go back in and get warm, and go back out.

“In addition, it was not feasible to put tire tracks or shoes prints in the snow and expect them to not be disturbed, and it was not cool to put fingerprints on outside windows in Filley Hall. We can now do that with the crime scene house and students can learn to process for evidence in the cold. Doing things in the cold takes special techniques and a strong spirit but is a good experience to have for this kind of work.”

Students do crime scene investigation in the murder house.
Craig Chandler | University Communication
Forensic science students survey the exterior of the Crime Scene House.

Students on the crime scene investigation track within the forensic science program have developed a lot of their skills in labs held outside at the property, which includes an old car riddled with bullet holes, varied tire treads for comparisons, faux shallow graves and more. But the interior of the house had been unusable until now. The house and surrounding property underwent extensive renovations and cleanup. Weather, six-legged creatures and a hole in the roof had all caused significant damage to the house, which became part of the program in 2016.

“It was in far worse condition than we originally thought. We had to take it down to the studs, and in some cases, even replace studs because of termite damage, but everything turned out great,” Adamowicz said. “We also had to add the ramp outside and a staircase to the upper level to make it compliant with all laws.

“After so many delays, we’re really happy it’s done. It was a long process, for a variety of reasons, but we were very fortunate that our administration kept it moving, especially Ron Yoder, who was a champion for the project.”

Completion of the house came just in time, as the number of crime scene investigation students taking the capstone course will nearly double next year. The forensic science program has seen marked growth in the last four years.

“I really don’t know how we could have handled that many students processing a Filley Hall crime scene, only having two in a room at a time,” Adamowicz said.

Kara Peightal and Sam Thomas look over evidence photographs.
Craig Chandler | University Communication
Kara Peightal and Sam Thomas look over evidence photographs.

Kara Peightal, a senior forensic science major from Omaha, said the house adds variety to what the students have been able to do.

“Last year, we were kind of stuck doing all of our stuff on the car, and it was kind of like processing the same scene every week,” Peightal said. “Now we can be inside and process a much larger scene, and have space to do it.”

For the capstone course, Peightal chose to oversee the photography of the scene. Working indoors and outdoors, with different surfaces and evidence, built on the skills she’d learned previously.

“I had to be aware of the different filters I’d need, and we’ll also be doing 3D imaging and scanning of the entire house,” she said. “That’s really cool to do because we’re using a Faro scanner, which is a really expensive piece of equipment, and I’m learning how to use it. Most CSI programs don’t have stuff like that.”

The house needs additional furniture, which will be acquired in the summer. In the fall, the house will be incorporated into FORS 120: Introduction to Forensic Science and FORS 400: Crime Scene Investigation. Adamowicz and Barksdale said the house is going to add more opportunities for students to learn, and they’re both excited to explore the possibilities.

“Whenever an asset gives you more options for your students, that’s a good thing,” Adamowicz said. “Really, our only limitations are the bounds of our imaginations.”

Brandy Branscom (center) and Mariya Dudin (right) log in evidence at the crime scene.
Craig Chandler | University Communication
Brandy Branscom (center) and Mariya Dudin (right) log evidence at the crime scene.
Forensic Science students in sterile suits collect evidence from a crime scene

There was a murder in the basement of Filley Hall this semester — or at least, the staging of a homicide crime scene. Signs of struggle were obvious. A desk chair was tipped over. Blood was splattered and items and substances were strewn about. What happened?

Students in the University of Nebraska–Lincoln’s Forensic Science Capstone class opened UNLFL Case #2021-0001, and began an investigation. They spent the better part of spring semester meticulously processing the scene, examining evidence, conducting laboratory tests and testifying in mock court.

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The capstone course is a culmination of everything they’ve learned in the major, said Michael Adamowicz, director of the program. And, despite the COVID-19 pandemic, the instructors were able to safely teach the course in person this semester.

“We kind of blend in certain aspects throughout their entire previous three and a half years and prep them for what's coming,” Adamowicz said. “We’ve made the class mimic the kind of training they’ll experience as a forensic analyst, when they join a lab.”

The course started with about three weeks of lecture, diving into such topics as testimony, forensic science professional ethics, career preparation (including resume or CV development), and public speaking.

Following the in-classroom lectures, the students were broken into three groups, based on their forensic science track, or emphasis — crime scene investigation, biology and chemistry — and the investigatory work began.

“In the capstone, we’re using everything we’ve learned,” said Abby Lutz, a senior forensic science major with a chemistry track. “In the course, you actually start to use all your skills, and you learn the processes of checking out evidence, making sure your chain of custody is right, using evidence worksheets — none of this we’ve done previously — and we cap it off with the testimony.”

The crime scene

In a room in Filley Hall, Adamowicz, along with co-instructors Larry Barksdale, assistant professor of practice, and Molly Reil, assistant professor of practice, set the scene of a chaotic homicide.

“Miss Susan Popolini was unfortunately murdered, the prime suspect is Rodney Cliffe, and there’s detection of a random janitor,” Adamowicz said. “The janitor is what’s called an elimination — someone who was detected in the area, had access, and has to be eliminated as a suspect. This is very common in real crime scenes. You’re going to have people who were in the area, but had nothing to do with the crime.”

The victim, played by a crime scene dummy, was stabbed. There were unknown substances, a (presumed) bloody sock, fingerprints, and footprints, among other evidence.

“We have one of our crime scene dummies, as the decedent, which had blood spatter stains for analysis,” Adamowicz said. “We had a pocket knife with a broken tip that was found. There was material spilled on the floor and on the desk. It's a fairly small room, and we stuffed a lot into it.”

Students in the crime scene investigation track processed the scene. Donning hazmat suits, safety glasses and booties, they worked throughout the room, finding fingerprints, looking for blood, gathering items as evidence and taking photographs.

The students kept detailed records as they went, documenting what they found and where, and the chain of evidence.

Brock Calamari removes a stained sock, which appears to be blood and will be tested. The work is part of the Forensic Science Capstone course, which brings together crime scene investigation, lab work and mock court testimony.
Craig Chandler | University Communication
Brock Calamari removes a stained sock. The stain appears to be blood and will be tested.

In the lab

While the CSI students were doing their work, the biology and chemistry students ran testimony drills with Adamowicz. After the evidence was collected from the scene, the biology- and chemistry-track students took the wheel of the investigation.

In the University of Nebraska–Lincoln Crime Lab, the students kept diligent logs and records of each class time as they went through the process of identifying substances, including blood, and running analyses.

A sock appears to have a blood stain and will be tested as part of collecting evidence.
Craig Chandler | University Communication
A sock appears to have a blood stain and will be tested as part of collecting evidence.

The biology students worked with three human samples of DNA, including the bloody sock. Adamowicz supplied the blood for the sock through an arrangement with his own doctor’s office. The other samples were swabs from the co-instructors.

“It's all real human stuff — it has to be,” Adamowicz said. “There’s about six weeks of actual scientific bench testing. A big chunk of this semester is hands-on laboratory work.”

While the biology students extracted the DNA, chemistry-track students were in charge of processing the unknown substances found at the scene. They analyzed pills, a green leafy substance and a white powder.

“All of these may or may not be controlled substances in a real-life scenario,” Adamowicz said. “For class, we used over-the-counter medications, and household items like oregano, salt, sugar and baking powder, but these things are nice analogs for things like marijuana and cocaine.”

Lutz said her crime lab experience felt true to life.

“For the white powder, we got to do chemical spot testing, with various reagents to see what it reacted to, and what that was consistent with,” Lutz said. “We used microscopy. We also have an instrument called the FTIR, or Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy, in the lab, and none of us had really used that before, so it was really beneficial to have that interaction with that instrument.”

Each student created reports from their analyses, which would eventually end up in front of them during testimony.

Tristan Kleinschrodt looks at a sample being tested to see if it is human blood in the UNL Crime Lab.
Craig Chandler | University Communication
Tristan Kleinschrodt looks at a sample being tested to see if it is human blood in the UNL Crime Lab.

In (mock) court

The semester ended with about three weeks of mock trial, when each of the 18 students testified in direct and cross examinations. The co-instructors served as the prosecutors and defense attorneys, according to their own specialty.

“Doing the mock testimony was interesting,” Lutz said. “It was nerve-wracking, but it was fun. It was extremely helpful.”

Adamowicz said this portion of the class is as important — if not more so — as the in-field and lab work.

“It draws everything together,” he said. “It draws on all of their technical skills, their presentation skills, and helps identify for them what they need to work on.”

Lauren Gipson is handed an evidence bag as she testifies on evidence she tested.
Craig Chandler | University Communication
Lauren Gipson is handed an evidence bag as she testifies on evidence she tested.

And the cross examination is meant to be tough.

“No forensic analyst ever goes to real court without practicing many times,” Adamowicz said. “A supervisor has to sign off on a trainee before they’re ever in court. Mistakes are very costly, so your analysts have to be trained harder than the real thing will be.”

During cross, the instructors often drilled down into the language used during the testimony — with good reason.

“I’m immediately going to jump in (in cross) if they didn’t define a word or phrase, because it is something you must do in court,” Adamowicz said. “We spent three and a half, four years teaching the students highly technical material, and by the end, we have our own, nearly incomprehensible language. We can’t use that in court because a jury will never understand, so I make sure during testimony that each student can really define those terms. We practice until they can do that.”

Meanwhile, the students not testifying served as jurors. Instead of determining guilt or innocence, they evaluate their peers’ testimony.

“We have students fill out evaluations and give those back to students so hopefully they get some constructive comments,” Adamowicz said. “Because this is the first time they have ever done anything like this, it’s helpful to know what they did well and not so well from the perspective of jurors listening.”

This semester’s class looked a little different. In the past, the mock trial has been held in the courtroom of the College of Law, but due to pandemic restrictions, that wasn’t possible.

“We had to be spread out, so we moved it to a classroom auditorium in Filley,” Adamowicz said. “Normally, we’d have all our jurors seated together, and the judge would sit at their bench. The courtroom also adds some theatricality to it — it feels like you’re really testifying.”

The capstone course also will look different in 2022, with the addition of the crime scene house, which is a property the university acquired in 2016, adjacent to and north of East Campus. The house has undergone renovations to make it usable as a crime scene for a variety of classes. There are also outdoor spaces, which have been utilized while renovations were ongoing, including a car crime scene, and areas for learning how to gather evidence through excavation, and for the study of decomposition.

“The crime scenes will be staged in the house, and that opens up a number of possibilities,” Adamowicz said. “I think it will add to the immersive feeling and to the education of our students because they’ll be in a house, with different rooms and items to process.”

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