Material for a 7-hour lesson, part of the Basic Training Program of Macedonian Police, developed by the Police Development Unit of the OSCE Spillover Monitor Mission to Skopje.

The effective detection of crime hinges completely on the successful gathering of evidence in relation to a particular crime committed. The first police officer who arrives at the scene of a crime plays a critical role in protecting and securing this material evidence. It is essential that the first police officer take the necessary steps to manage and protect the crime scene and other sites where material evidence is likely to be found. The unintentional contamination of crime scenes by curious officers, detectives, and supervisors is a major problem. Crime scenes often yield evidence that will lead to the arrest of a suspect(s). Unfortunately, just as often, potentially valuable evidence is destroyed or rendered useless by careless behavior at the crime scene. Thus, first responding police officers must remember that they are NOT to touch anything that could jeopardize a crime scene.

In order to ensure that contamination does not occur, students must be aware of what constitutes evidence. Many types of evidence can be found at the scene of a crime, such as fingerprints, palm prints, shoe and tire impressions, tools and tool-marks, weapons and ammunition, glass, soil, hair and fibers, body fluids, documents, rope, tape, drugs, explosives, etc. Since the evidence will be used throughout the entire investigation and court trials, it is very important to avoid common errors. While this lesson will not focus on gathering this evidence (as it is the role of the specialized police units to do this), students will be introduced to different types of evidence to provide them with an understanding of the importance of protecting and securing the crime scene.

The goal of this lesson is to introduce students to the responsibilities of the first officer in securing, collecting and handling critical material evidence likely to be immediately encountered at a serious crime scene. Students will also be introduced to an overview of different types of evidence which they are responsible for protecting.

At the conclusion of this lesson, students will be able to:

1. Identify the procedure the first responding officer should follow when making the initial response to a crime scene.
2. Outline the procedure required of initial responders for ensuring the safety of officers and others present at a crime scene.
3. Identify the means by which the initial responder ensures medical attention to injured persons while preventing contamination of the scene.
4. Outline the procedure required of the initial responder in protecting the crime scene.
5. Outline the procedure involved in defining and controlling the boundaries or security perimeters of a crime scene as a means of protecting and securing the crime scene(s).
6. Outline the procedure required of the initial responder when providing a detailed crime scene briefing to the investigator(s) in charge of the scene.
7. Identify the types of information that the initial responder should document at the crime scene.
8. Name the three (3) basic patterns found in fingerprints.
9. Define the term, “latent fingerprint”.
10. List the three (3) categories of footwear evidence.
11. Identify the four (4) means by which tire impressions can be documented, lifted, and preserved.
12. Identify the different types of evidence police officers will encounter in crime scenes.