Forensic Science in the United States- Possible Lesson for India
Expert Profile
Mr. Barry A. J. Fisher grew up in New York city. He studied chemistry-BS, MS. Then he has completed his MBA. After completing his studies, he moved to the Los Angeles and joined the LASD crime lab in 1969.
He retired after 40 years of his dedicated service. He is a member of numerous professional organizations. He is the Past-President of the American Society of Crime Lab Directors. He served as a President of the American Academy of Forensic Sciences, President of the International Association of Forensic sciences, and was a member of International Association for identification, International association of toxicologists, and International association of chiefs of police. He has also distributed three books on the field of Forensic Science: Techniques of crime scene investigation, Journal of Criminalistics, and Journal of Forensics.
Foreground
The session was started with an impressive introduction to Mr. Barry A. J. Fisher. After that Barry sir has started the session by briefing about the status and role of forensic science in a criminal investigation in the United states and he has also advised very important lessons and pinpoints that must be used and be learned for a better forensic investigation in the Indian scenario.
In today’s world where crime is increasing rapidly all over the world, Forensic science plays a very crucial role in the criminal justice system. Forensic science includes proper use and management of laboratories where managers may influence legislative, and policy matters about forensic science. There are various forensic science elements in the criminal justice system that can be considered as a major requirement in solving crime. Often, these elements are not in direct contact with each other, they may vary in different agencies of government, different regions, and different states.
Forensic science in the USA is an adversarial system. In the courtroom, experts on both sides argue to put the best case in front of the Judiciary depending on the related facts. The adversarial system has resulted in better-prepared defense attorneys and made greater use of statistics and probability.
The United States is a mixture of Federal and State judicial systems with different criminal laws. There are around 50 states in the United States which have different rules and laws across the area. The Federal law enforcement in the United States includes FBI, DEA, DOD, etc. The state law of enforcement in the United States includes Police, sheriffs, prosecution, and medical examiners. The experts can face different challenges during their daily professional work. They might face questions while testifying related to education, training, proficiency tests, error rates, bias, ethical conduct, and prior mistakes also. Also, managing the crime lab, Directors have numerous duties which may include personnel training, hiring recruitments, purchasing products for the lab, maintaining the quality assurance, deciding the budget, shaping lab policy, leadership issues for the staff and many more.
The CFS organization has learned to be an advocate. Advocacy is the pursuit of influencing outcomes including public policy and resource allocation decisions within political institutions. To be effective in advocacy, one should involve all key players, stakeholders. Establishing a shared vision between various elements and choosing a realistic strategy is very important in an organization that you are involved with. Measuring success is sometimes incremental to becoming a champion in the forensic science area.
Finding key people and staying in touch with them helps in building networks in a particular field of interest. Some elements and some acts of public safety are important and if someone has any good source of information then reaching out to the people is the best thing to do.
The following figure intails some ways to write your representative.
And in the last, the speaker advised some important pinpoints which we should imply in the Indian scenario such as we must know and learn about how we can influence the process, developed a plan of action and also we must understand the dos and do'nt of crime scene investigation. he also advised not to forget that the media makes friends with news people.
conclusion
the session was so informative and details many important aspects of crime scene investigation and application of forensic science in a criminal investigation in the united states and what are the loopholes which should not be ignored. for me, this session was all about exploring forensics in international scenarios and it was so interesting to know these exciting and nailbiting facts. I would suggest my readers to once watch the session recording on the youtube channel forensic365 for a better understanding of this session ad the expert talk of Mr. Barry A. J. Fisher