In the News

Forensics Programs Educating Students at WVU

Posted on www.afte.org, Tuesday, September 11, 2007 ; 11:25 PM
Story by Amanda McCall - Originally published by West Virginia Media

MORGANTOWN - There have been a lot of advances in security and technology since the September 11 terrorist attacks West Virginia University has been known for its forensics programs for several years. Teachers educate their students by showing them real world situations like the events of 9/11.

Dr. Keith Morris once worked in a South African crime lab. He's experienced on how traveling has been since September 11 "As an international traveler," said Morris, "coming through United States a lot more strict. You get finger prints on entry a lot more and applying for your visa."

Morris is now a forensic professor at the university. He says fingerprints play a major role in determining identification. "Identification is really a fundamental role in forensic science plays," said Morris. "We always want to try to identify who committed a crime."

That's why the school has the Integrated Ballistic Identification System or IBIS to analyze possible crime scene weapons.

The IBIS is a worldwide identification system that is not only used in the classroom, but also across the country and across the world in forensics firearm examination.

Still another piece to the puzzle is how a weapon is made. WVU student Melissa Pablic is learning what chemicals can create an explosive. One day she wants work with the FBI and already sees the real world in her studies.

"There are always relationships," said Pablic. "More people that can go out there to boil things down when it happened, how it happened."

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