This past Wednesday, March 29, my fundamentals in biomedical sciences (II) class continued on our forensic week activities with a mock scenario! Thus far in forensic week, we have learned about the types of forensic evidence, the function it serves in court, and various ways of acquiring it. Today, we got to observe a scene and try to obtain forensic evidence. In the coming days we will use our evidence to determine if the death we witnessed came from suicide or murder.
We were split into two groups to assess the scene. The scene was of the death of (fake) Mrs. Nease. We had one live actor, Mr. Nease. My group sought first to question Mr. Nease. We asked him simply: “What happened here?”; he replied simply: “I loved my wife, I tried to save her”. After further questioning, he refused to answer, asking only for an attorney. This is where we made a grave mistake. We went inside to assess the scene, leaving him alone outside. He quickly made an escape after questioning right under our noses. He left carrying a bloody rag right along with him. Despite this major loss, we still were able to acquire valuable evidence. Inside the home, we found Mrs. Nease dead with one clean bullet directly through her brain. Based on the angle of blood splatter on the wall, we determined she was sitting when the bullet went through her brain at a 90 degree angle. The bullet wound was synonymous with soft contact, with slight tattooing by the head. She had no defense wounds and no signs of rape.We were able to collect a gun, laptop, two cellphones, and a coffee mug to be checked for evidence. We will see all digital evidence tomorrow. The gun was checked for prints, but all prints found were smudged. There was one print in blood on the gun, though, and it belonged to Paul Nease.
All we did today was gather evidence that might lead to a clear decision on where or not Mrs. Nease committed suicide. We will put this evidence to use tomorrow as we try to put together a case to either prove Mr. Nease as a murderer or a victim. I’m excited to see how this plays out.
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