Citation

Rezos MM, Schultz JJ, Murdock RA, Smith SA. J. Forensic Sci. 2011; 56(5): 1289-1295.

Affiliation

Department of Anthropology, University of Central Florida, 4000 Central Florida Blvd. Orlando, FL 32816. Orange County Sheriff's Office, Forensic Unit, 2500 West Colonial Drive, Orlando, FL.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2011, American Society for Testing and Materials, Publisher John Wiley and Sons)

DOI

10.1111/j.1556-4029.2011.01802.x

PMID

21554314

Abstract

Forensic personnel generally use basic all-metal detectors for weapon searches because of their ease of use and cost efficiency. For ferromagnetic targets, an alternative easy to use and low-cost geophysical tool is a magnetic locator. The following study was designed to demonstrate the effectiveness of a common, commercially available magnetic locator in forensic weapon searches by determining the maximum depth of detection for 32 metallic forensic targets and testing the effects of metallic composition on detection. Maximum depth of detection was determined for 16 decommissioned street-level firearms, six pieces of assorted scrap metals, and 10 blunt or bladed weapons by burying each target at 5-cm intervals until the weapons were no longer detected. As expected, only ferromagnetic items were detected; weapons containing both ferromagnetic and nonferromagnetic components were generally detected to shallower depths. Overall, the magnetic locator can be a useful addition to weapon searches involving buried ferromagnetic weapons.

Language: en