Technology on TV

A lot of it does happen, but not remotely in the glitzy context you see on TV.

For example, they'll sit at a workstation and "bring up all the records of white Fords rented in New York in 2008 and cross-reference the renters addresses by distance from 584 Maple St.". A few keystrokes later you see a list scroll up the screen.

In the real world, that isn't done by a computer. It's done by perople. Usually youngish ones - often named Zach or maybe Megan - who spend weeks calling around, wading through piles of paper, scribbling in the margins using dull stubby pencils with no erasers.

Pretty much the same goes for any kind of medical evidence work. Although one key difference is usually those guys use cheap pens instead of pencils.

Makes ya wonder if maybe the government might be hiding something huh?

nah

Some of the analysis is VERY real, but the analysis times are edited for television purposes. Some of the tests I see with regards to DNA and mass spectroscopy are factual (including the nice databases that say "red paint,fingernail, brand ____, 2001") but some of the analytics might represent days or weeks of work for a person not the 25 seconds we see on the show.

Yes I agree with you. Notice the actors dresses. It would appear that they solved the crime within one day. They have the same dresses worn for the whole show. And notice how one travels to the crime scene collecting the evidence and then next scene shows them in the lab processing the collected samples, and got the result within minutes. This is only a show. The time was not factored in.

you are watching too many movies my friend

Discovery science once posted a program about the real thing

those movies and movie series are as real as star trek

only fiction

Most (if not all) are based on actual real world technology that either exists or is a work-in-progress (ie- lab testing stage). Where do you think the writers get their ideas? they get them from the current news, publications, other TV programs and movies, etc (it is lazy but we sort of have to cut them a bit of slack due to the vast amounts of stories they need to write in a short time). Sometimes the whole TV episode is based on a single idea (for example - CSI did an episode based on the "Metal Storm" weapon system, NCIS did one on the jet pack that was recently in the news at the time, etc, etc).

The problem is almost all of what you see is totally exaggerated for Hollywood effect (many times, totally unnecessary in my opinion unless they are trying to bypass copyright, etc). Although interactive holographic displays exist, the high-tech holographic displays portrayed on CSI and Bones don't even exist on Star Trek, let alone real life <cringe>.

I'm curious as to the gathering of DNA evidence tricks used by police agencies. Ie: retrieving an empty drink container that was discarded by a suspect or offering an uncooperative suspect something to drink in order to retrieve DNA and fingerprints. It sounds like it would work, but do the police actually work like this?

You can only be framed if your innocent.

It sounds like it would work, but do the police actually work like this?

To some extent, but my understanding is although DNA testing has developed it is still time consuming and costly (and DNA databases are still VERY limited, no matter what the movies or conspiracy theorists say).

There have been cases won (and lost) on DNA evidence, examples would be cases involving rape where large amounts of DNA could be recovered and compared to the DNA of a single or small number of suspects. The other problems I have heard about regarding DNA testing are regarding its provable reliability and result uncertainty, hence ability to be used as evidence in a conviction when contested by the defendants lawyer(s). Then of course you have to find the suspect to perform the comparison, because there is no guarantee he/she will be in any DNA database (especially if a first offender).

As a side note one of my friends brothers is a real CSI in New Zealand (I don't know what acronym they use here). His comments regarding the accuracy of the TV series 'CSI' are far from glowing.

I agree with most people the technology shown is here or just around the corner. The time factor is seriously skewed though. A few things worry me about what I see on these shows.

1. The amount of personal information that can be located by their computers weven on ordinary Joe's with no criminal record.
2. Those scenes where there are 200 "suspects" say in a crowded restaurant where a crime has been committed and they are able to take DNA samples from everyone. "Just to rule you out you understand"
3. A large portion of the public now expects the criminal system to work this fast and expects every court case to have slam dunk forensic evidence. Horatio Cane is NOT coming to your house to collect evidence after Susy's bike was stolen.

One thing that I wondered about is the use of rubber gloves, with the people using cell phones and high-end Nikon cameras. How do you sanitize a cell phone or camera contaminated with the nasty stuff those gloves have been in?