NCJ Number
177594
Date Published
1998
Length
247 pages
Annotation
This book offers the new criminal environmental investigator numerous investigative techniques that can be applied to a variety of environmental crime investigations.
Abstract
Each of the investigative techniques and evidence-gathering procedures described in this book has been successfully used in criminal environmental prosecutions. The author also offers information on the numerous safety requirements that must be followed so as to safely and properly collect physical evidence at an environmental crime scene. A chapter on the criminal environmental investigator addresses training, equipment, standard operating procedures, and locating and using resources. A chapter on search warrants describes methods for collecting evidence sufficient to establish probable cause as the basis for obtaining a search warrant. Other topics on search warrants address planning, the search-warrant team, the briefing, the staging, warrant execution, surreptitious entry, and postsearch investigation. A chapter on hazardous-waste-abandonment investigations provides job descriptions of the investigative team, techniques for various investigative tasks, and suggestions for abandoned trailer investigations and hazardous waste tanker investigations. Remaining chapters focus on drum-tracing techniques, sampling for criminal evidence, chemical analysis of criminal evidence, and hazardous waste "sting" operations. 54 notes, a table of hazardous substances and statutory authority, a subject index, and a glossary