The Game is Afoot: Blood Spatter and Ballistics

Come, Watson, come! The game is afoot”

  -Sherlock Holmes,

The Adventure of the Abbey Grange 

And indeed, it had. The first workshop conducted by Justitia in the new year began with a quick introduction of the club and its current members, taking pride in being the first and only Forensic Medicine club in Manipal.

Following this, the workshop began with Sriya, the President of Justitia, clearing the misconception between blood spatter and splatters, respectively. Her teammates took over, with Aaryan expanding on the meaning of the angle of impact and how the directionality of a bloodstain differentiates between a murder and a suicide. The participants learned to calculate the angle of impact using simple trigonometry, explaining its humble origins.



Next up was Kaushiki who talked about satellite spatter and how different weapons exhibit respective kinds of spatter when used. She elaborated by describing different types of bloodstains and patterns. She spoke about the types of spatters formed based on their impact (high-speed, medium-speed, and low-speed). At regular intervals, the participants were engaged in differentiating between different kinds of spatters based on the workshop’s progress at different intervals. Their curiosity was further heightened by exciting tidbits such as the recipe for cleaning up blood and how blood is collected at a crime scene, to mention a few. A workshop with blood at the crux of its discussion would be incomplete without the mention of the character Patrick Bateman. Consequently, a short clip from the cult-classic movie “American Psycho” depicting the murder of Paul Allen was shown.

   

The workshop’s highlight went to the two installed stations, Ballistics and Blood Spatter stations, respectively. The participants were divided into groups and given a tour. The Blood Spatter station, headed by Kanika and Ayush, demonstrated the different kinds of spatters previously explained and encouraged the participants to create their own spatters using droppers and various instruments. The Ballistics station, headed by Prakhar and Sriya, gave a more theoretical approach to the different kinds of guns, the differences between each, and how the distance and direction of a firing weapon from a victim can be gauged using ballistics. A demonstration of a gun being fired was also showcased.

The workshop concluded with an intriguing mock case, displaying the various rationale of the participants, followed by a discussion of the same. Pulling the curtains down on a very informative and engaging workshop, the evening ended with the promise of many more such events in the future.


Written by: Adrian Rex Coutinho for MTTN 

Edited by: Ishita Sharma for MTTN

Images by: Japman Kaur for MTTN

 

 

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