Activities per year
Abstract
Advances in computational and information technologies have facilitated the acquisition of geospatial information for regional and national soil and geology databases. These have been completed for a range of purposes from geological and soil baseline mapping to economic prospecting and land resource assessment, but have become increasingly used for forensic purposes. On the question of provenance of a questioned sample, the geologist or soil scientist will draw invariably on prior expert knowledge and available digital map and database sources in a ‘pseudo Bayesian’ approach. The context of this paper is the debate on whether existing (digital) geology and soil databases are indeed useful and suitable for forensic inferences. Published and new case studies are used to explore issues of completeness, consistency, compatibility and applicability in relation to the use of digital geology and soil databases in environmental and criminal forensics. One key theme that emerges is that, despite an acknowledgement that databases can be neither exhaustive nor precise enough to portray spatial variability at the scene of crime scale, coupled with expert knowledge, they play an invaluable role in providing background or
reference material in a criminal investigation. Moreover databases can offer an independent control set of samples.
reference material in a criminal investigation. Moreover databases can offer an independent control set of samples.
Original language | English |
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Pages (from-to) | 109-119 |
Number of pages | 11 |
Journal | Geological Society Special Publication |
Volume | 384 |
Early online date | 24 Jul 2013 |
DOIs | |
Publication status | Published - 24 Jul 2013 |
Keywords
- Forensics
- databases
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The Russian Federal Centre of Forensic Science (RFCFS) of the Ministry of Justice of Russia and IUGS IFG Soil Forensics and Forensic Geology’ Knowledge Transfer event
Jennifer McKinley (Invited speaker)
22 Oct 2013Activity: Participating in or organising an event types › Participation in workshop, seminar, course
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Invited presentation at GIS Ireland 2013
Jennifer McKinley (Speaker)
17 Oct 2013Activity: Talk or presentation types › Invited talk
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Second Iberoamerican Workshop & Training in Forensic Geology
Jennifer McKinley (Invited speaker)
02 Oct 2013 → 04 Oct 2013Activity: Participating in or organising an event types › Participation in workshop, seminar, course