Criminal Investigations Chapter free essay sample

In addition, Pinker created what was allied the rogues gallery which detailed the names and operations of known criminals and their associates. During the European Industrial Revolution, thief catchers (now known as informants, snitches, and a variety of other names) were hired to help law enforcement catch criminals, a practice which is obviously still In use today. In addition, thief catchers were also criminals In their own right, which made it easier to infiltrate the targeted criminals.In eighteenth century Paris, a personal identification system, known as the Brillion System, became the first yester based on the Idea that human characteristics such skeleton size and eye color were the same throughout a persons life. In the rand eighteenth century, the study of fingerprints became a popular way to identify crime suspects. They did not learn until the turn of the century that each persons fingerprints were unique and could not be changed. Scotland yard, founded In the early eighteenth century, was the model that the FBI modeled Itself after Initially.All of these are examples In which criminal investigations of today have been influenced, directly and indirectly, by the east and the progress that has been made in the time that has gone by since then. 2. Q: Discuss ways In which the media have affected our perceptions of the reality of criminal Investigation. A: As with any field outside the scope of the public arena, the medias perspective on crime investigation is almost entirely responsible for the perceptions of the general public because the media has a much larger audience.Rather than studying the topic, the general public chooses to get their Information from the media. A fantastic example of how the public gains Information about rimming investigation in particular, is known as the CSS effect. In recent years, numerous TV shows based on the roles and duties of law enforcement and crime scene Investigators have received very high ratings from their viewing audience, thereby creating a considerable amount of Interest In the field of forensic science.Of course, these shows are rarely ever based on reality, and people often form assumptions about the capacity and range of law enforcements abilities regarding investigations, and the Idea that law enforcement has virtually unlimited resources. However, In reality, law enforcement Is very Limited as to what they are able to do In comparison with the space-age type of investigation tools and techniques used on television. There is much more bureaucratic red tape, and the technologies displayed on television simply do not exist.In addition, the CSS effect gives the inaccurate Impression that every crime Is given individualized attention, and that each crime Is solved quickly using the latest In technological advances. Again, the advances used on television do not exist in the real world, and the volume of cases in the real world OFF each of them in a timely fashion. In reality, many crimes go unsolved, many take a long time to solve, and there is simply not enough time in a day to fixate each individual crime where there are so much more than need the attention of law enforcement. 3.Q: Discuss the role of the FBI and how it has changed criminal investigation over the years. A: The official role of the FBI is to protect the US from terrorist and foreign intelligence threats, to uphold and enforce laws of the US, and to provide aid and services to other law enforcement agencies. The FBI investigates crimes after hey happen, and employs numerous measures to prevent crime. In 1929, the FBI introduced the I-JAR crime report, which collects information on serious crimes reported to law enforcement. These crimes include homicide, rape, robbery, aggravated assault, burglary, larceny, theft, motor vehicle theft, and arson.Among the categories of crime investigated are terrorism, espionage, government corruption, organized crime, white collar crime, violent crimes, and major thefts. The FBI has made vast progress in the field of investigation by introducing methods of identifying suspects, such as fingerprinting. The FBI also uses expert systems, which are computer models used to profile certain types of criminals. One of them is the system used by the National Center for the Analysis of Violent Crime, which develops investigative strategies based on theories which are formed from the criminal profiles which are dependent on the findings of computer models.Many of these system specialize in one area of expertise, such blood serum analysis, counterterrorism, and so forth. One more development by the FBI which drastically hanged how it conducts investigations was the development of what are known as relational databases which have the ability to quickly and efficiently sort large quantities of records and information. The most widely known of these databases was known as Big Floyd, which the FBI used for many years.Since the creation of Big Floyd, there have been massive and unprecedented improvements to such databases to adapt to more modern problems. In 1999, the national sex offender registry, which was created as part of an upgrade of the Bis current computer systems, was introduced to the internet. Yet another system the FBI has used in its investigations is face recognition technology, called leaner, has been used to age photographs of missing children to give investigators and law enforcement of good idea of what the child would look like after all the time the child has been missing.A similar system is being used by police sketch artists to draw sketches or suspects. All of these are more are Just some of the advances and improvements made in the criminal investigations field since the creation of the FBI. 4. Q: List and discuss promising developments in criminal investigation technology hat have emerged in recent years. A: As mentioned previously, numerous computer systems exist today to aid law enforcement in investigations. These are called smart systems and relational databases.Among these systems are the national sex offender registry; leaner, which age photographs of missing children to help locate them years after theyve gone missing; the Total Information Awareness information sorting and pattern matching software to sort through numerous government and business databases in an attempt to identify suspected terror wreaths; and another promising new piece of technology is called the Combat Zones That SEE program, which is being developed for military use on foreign soil, which will build a large surveillance system by networking existing cameras from numerous popular and frequented surveillance points such as parking lots and train platforms, which send images to highly advanced computer processors which are capable of recognizing suspects by physical characteristics such as eyes, hair color, facial features, body language, etc. 5. Q: Explain the differences between proactive and reactive investiga tions. A: The differences between the two types of investigations are the same differences between proactive and reactive reasoning. Reactive investigations are those that are conducting after the commission of a crime; for example, inspecting a murder victim for fibers the killer may have left behind in an attempt to create a profile of the kind of person who committed the murder. Other parts of the reactive investigation include interviewing witnesses, and using the evidence found at the crime to at least attempt to identify and/or arrest the suspected perpetrator. Proactive investigations, n the other hand, are investigations conducted before a crime is committed because a crime has been anticipated, and the suspected perpetrator has already been identified before the crime has been committed. This is typical in sting operations, and when informants have contacted law enforcement to provide information on a crime they have received from a third party. The informant may know the suspect personally, and the suspect may have even directly stated the crime he or she was planning to commit. In some instances, such investigations likely assist in preventing heretical future crimes from occurring. 6. Q: Discuss the various types of criminal investigations.A: Among the types of investigations that criminal investigators regularly conduct are background investigations, which are used in pre-employment applicant screenings to determine whether a person is suitable and qualified for a position in which the public trust will be placed on their shoulders; Suspected violations of criminal law, which can range from something as simple as possession of illegal drugs or stolen property, to something as serious as terrorism and murder; violations f civil law, which are investigated to determine financial liability on the part of the defendant, and Vice, which is drug activity and organized crime activity. The crime scene unit provides services such as crime processing, identifying fingerprints, and forensic photos. This unit responds to serious crime scenes to find, preserve, document, and collect evidence. This unit also helps identify unknown victims, suspects, witnesses, etc. , and works closely with the detective bureau in follow up investigations, in addition to suspect location, apprehension and arrest.