It has been argued that television shows that deal with crime and forensic science; shows like CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, or CSI: Miami etc. give food for thought to criminals or wannabe criminals. There is of course a degree of truth in this. But television programmes and movies about crimes, detectives and police investigations have been around for ever. Let alone the books, magazines and articles about the subject. Classic figures like Sherlock Holmes and Hercules Poirot may seem out of date, but they would give an insight to police investigations at their time.
But another affect of these programmes, was the exponential increase of forensic science degrees offered by universities around the world. Recently it was stated by a Scottish university academic, that before CSI, they could hardly have enough students in chemistry or biology to keep the course running. Add the word forensics in the title of the degree, and the next day your course is overbooked.
British universities (that is where my experience derives from, although I assume that the same goes for USA and other countries) now offer Bachelors and Masters in any possible discipline that can have the word “forensics” fit in its title. Biology and forensics, Chemistry and forensics, forensic accounting, forensic engineering, computer forensics, forensic informatics, forensic linguistics, forensic archaeology … you name it. There is a forensic title for ..everything.
The question occured to me during my studies, when during a career orientation class, I suggested that if not all of us find a job with law enforcement or the government upon our graduation, we might as well become the “perfect criminals”. The answer of one of the participating professors surprised me. He said that they do not joke about it, as they believed it was a matter of time to see one of their graduates arrested by Interpol at the 8 o’clock news. Another added that if the student was a good one, he would not get arrested in the first place. And then I realised that studying forensics, the first thing you must do is to start thinking like criminal.
In our course we had a lot of theory and labs in identifying fingerprints, blood, other bodily fluids, examine papers and tool-marks, footwear prints and blood stains. We learned what the police protocols are in a crime scene. We even had a large scale crime scene exercise to practice our new skills. During our theory and practical labs, we also learned what you need to clean a crime scene from blood, how not to leave DNA evidence and how to break a window without having any glass traces on our clothes.
In the rest of the course, in computer forensics, we learned how we can avoid leaving digital evidence, destroy traces of our activities and make sure we are not identified.
In a sense, we were trained to become the perfect “crime mind”. We know the police protocols, and we even know how to plant evidence or even how to make things “look like an accident”!!!
Sounds funny when we discuss it with friends, but it is not a funny story at all. This means that people with the right skills can pull off more careful plans and execute them with scientific precision, leaving the law enforcement trying to put the pieces together with a very little probability of success.
On the other hand of course, a forensic scientist can understand the risks of certain illegal activities, and this understanding can keep him/her away from trouble.
What can be done, is a rather philosophical question. You can not stop offering forensics courses in the universities, and you can not make it a secretive in-house thing for the police. The industry will collapse and the research will simply cease to exist.
A few years ago, in Athens, the terrorist group “17 November” was dismantled, after one of its members was injured trying to place a bomb. The group were the “untouchables” of European terrorism for more than 25 years. The Greek police was helped by the FBI, Scotland Yard and even the MI5 (according to some sources), but they managed to do absolutely nothing for a quarter of a century. It turned out that the group consisted of very few individuals, highly trained and very well educated; one of the head figures being an academic. It is this kind of hi-tech crime that forensic scientists can be involved in.
The issue needs to be addressed, but only at an academic level at this stage.
Education can not be controlled and barred to certain people, in our society. There may be safety measures as to who gets access to crime related education, but then again a lot of other disciplines will have to start imposing restrictions. It is also almost senseless to check criminal records, as an 18 year olds student is not likely to have any criminal record, or in some cases some cautions for being drunk or breaking the peace.
There is no proof that forensic scientists become “Godfathers”, but the truth remains that they can, if they wish. A new breed of hi-tech criminals that would be faster, smarter and more up-to-date then their police counterparts, can be a scary prospect for the future.
But this is just the theory. There are black sheep in every family … so there are bound to be some bad ones in forensics. But truth be told, most of us have a good sense of justice, and are getting satisfaction by contributing to the fight against crime.
As for the law enforcement agencies, it is their responsibility to train their people, update their procedures, hire “new blood” with new ideas and modern training, and keep one step ahead from the criminals.