The Frequency of Occurrence of Paint and Glass on the Clothing of High School Students

Abstract

The frequency of occurrence of paint chips and glass fragments on the outer clothing and footwear of 213 high school students from different areas of the city of Vancouver was determined. Paint and glass respectively were found on ca. 14% and 2% of the outer clothing items, and on ea, 24% and 5% of footwear. These figures are significantly lower than figures reported in similar studies in the last 25 years. RESUMELa frequence avec laquelle des ecailles de peinture et des fragments de verre se retrouvent sur les vetements exterleurs et les chaussures de 213 etudtants du secondaire de differents quartiers de la ville de Vancouver a ete determlnee, De la peinture et du verre ont respectivement ete trouves sur environ 14% et 2% des articles vestimentaires exterleurs, et sur environ 24% et 5% des chaussures. Ces chiffres sont plus bas, et ce, de manlere significative que les chiffres rapportes dans des etudes semblables lors des 25 dernleres annees,

The level of random background glass recovered from fleece jackets of individuals who worked in Law enforcement or related professions

“…No broken glass Broken glass Petterd et al [10] Lau et al [11] McQuillian et al [8] Ross et al [13] Coulson et al [9] Lambert et al [ reported in previous studies, however the numbers of fragments within individual groups present were more akin to data produced from studies involving individuals suspected of activities involving broken glass.…”

“…A summary of comparisons to the studies of McQuillian et al [8], Coulson et al [9], Pettard et al [10], Lau et al [11], Lambert et al [12] and Ross et al [13] is presented in Table 3.…”

“…In order to do this in a meaningful way, an understanding of the prevalence of glass fragments on for example, clothing from the general population and clothing of those suspected of criminal activity both involving and not involving glass breaking is required. Previous research in the area can be presented as either general population surveys, where the issue becomes the determination of the prevalence of glass on a member of the publics clothing [7][8][9][10][11] and surveys relating to the determination of the amount of glass recovered from clothing of those suspected of criminal activity related to activities where glass breaking could be involved [8,9,12] and where the activity was not thought to involve breaking glass. [13] The general consensus of this work was, that while glass was recovered from clothing worn by the public was generally less than from clothing taken from individuals suspected of criminal activity.…”

The Statistical Interpretation of Forensic Glass Evidence

“…Equation (4) in Example 1 contains a number of quantities that must be estimated. The P terms and S terms, relating to the size and number of recovered groups, can be estimated via clothing surveys (Pearson et al, 1971;McQuillan & McCrossan, 1987;McQuillan & Edgar, 1992;Lambert et al, 1995;Lau et al, 1997;Coulson et al, 2001). Coulson et al (2001) have devoted considerable effort in the statistical modelling of the P and S terms concerning the number and size of groups of glass found on clothing.…”

The migration of fragments of glass from the pockets to the surfaces of clothing

“…A study by and Lau et al [4] examined clothing and footwear for glass and paint. Only one fragment was found in the pockets searched.…”