FORENSIC SCIENCE
This Latin word means “of or before the forum.”
What is forensis?
This is the first step of the scientific method.
What is observation?
This specialist extracts and analyzes DNA from blood, hair, and tissue.
Who is a biologist?
Forensic scientists should base their conclusions on this rather than personal opinions.
What is data?
Forensic science turns evidence into this.
What is truth?
Forensic science is the application of __________ to solve legal matters and crimes.
What is science?
In forensic science, this means carefully examining evidence without making assumptions.
What is observation?
This specialist identifies unknown substances, tests for poisons, and analyzes drug composition.
Who is a chemist?
This person or group—not the forensic scientist—decides whether a person is guilty or innocent.
Who are the judge and jury?
“Forensic” comes from the Latin word forensis, which is connected to this place in ancient Rome where public and legal matters took place.
What is the forum?
Forensic scientists are sometimes called these because they translate the “silent language of evidence” into objective facts.
What are translators?
This is a testable prediction about what the evidence shows.
What is a hypothesis?
This specialist reconstructs vehicle crashes, determines bullet trajectories, and analyzes impact patterns.
Who is a physicist?
A forensic scientist who is fair and does not take sides is described by this word.
What is impartial?
A scientist who takes sides in a criminal case is violating the principle of being this.
What is impartial?
Forensic science is described as this because it combines biology, chemistry, physics, geology, and other fields.
What is interdisciplinary?
During this step, scientists conduct experiments to verify or refute a hypothesis.
What is testing?
This specialist traces soil samples, matches minerals, and can link suspects to specific locations.
Who is a geologist?
A forensic scientist finds evidence that does not support the police's theory. The scientist should still report the evidence because their conclusions must be based on this.
What is data, not opinion?
A scientist says, “I think this suspect did it, so I'm going to interpret the evidence to support that idea.” This is NOT how forensic conclusions should be made because conclusions must be based on ________.
What is data?
Every piece of evidence analyzed in a forensic laboratory must be able to withstand this in court.
What is scrutiny?
A forensic scientist uses the data collected during testing to create this report of what the data proves.
What is a conclusion?
A crime scene contains DNA, an unknown powder, bullet damage, and soil. The investigation would likely require multiple specialists because forensic science is a ____________________.
What is a collaboration of many fields?
A forensic scientist examines evidence and gives the court objective information, but does NOT make this decision.
What is whether the suspect is guilty or innocent?
A fingerprint, strand of hair, chemical substance, or soil sample cannot speak for itself. Forensic scientists analyze this “silent language” and translate it into this type of information for the court.
What are objective facts?