Wider Horizons

A theme song by The Who blasts through the hallways. Are we in Las Vegas, Miami or New York?wildlife csi Lethbridge College actually, and there really isn’t a theme song, but this wildlife crime scene investigation seminar is certainly worthy of one.

For the first time in Canada, 25 fish and wildlife enforcement officers received training on wildlife field forensics: cutting-edge information that has never been available to them before. The value of this education for Canada’s fish and wildlife enforcement officers cannot be understated, and in August, Lethbridge College played host to the significant event.

Allan Orr, environmental science instructor at Lethbridge College, was responsible for bringing it to Canada. After witnessing the wildlife field forensics seminar firsthand in Montana last year, he knew he had to bring it here. “We are giving Canadian officers access to training that was never available before,” he says. “I just felt the provincial officers, certainly ones in western Canada in particular, could use this training. Having been one myself, I knew there was a need for it.”

What do officers actually do at wildlife crime scenes? In the real world, it’s very similar to what police do when they investigate a murder. The officers are trying to connect a dead animal on the ground to the weapon used to kill it to the person who pulled the trigger. These three elements come together for a successful outcome or prosecution. Officers collect evidence and have experts in labs analyze it. They collect things like bullets, casings and cigarette butts, and they take castings of tire tracks.

Sending evidence to labs can be a time-consuming process. Until recently this was just the way it was done. Orr says, contrary to most of the forensics training that exists, the wildlife field forensics training shows officers how to do things in the field, not the lab. “Right now there is such an ability gap between the field officers and the scientist that we’re really just trying to close that gap a bit,” he says. Wildlife officers can do a lot of forensics work themselves right in the field, but not to the point they’d be considered experts in court. “We want them to be experts in the field,” says Orr.

For example, if a field officer finds a bullet, he can look at it with a simple 10-power handheld lens and compare it to a rifle. The officer can identify basic characteristics of commonality. He can use the information to start interviewing witnesses and potential suspects in hopes of getting a confession. Orr says, “We’re not looking at getting information that specifically convicts people or puts them in jail. We’re getting info that gives us reasonable and probable grounds to get a search warrant or to take a statement from somebody and then get further information to carry on with the investigation.”

The evidence is still sent to a lab because the experts will need to confirm the findings in court, but at least the field officer can keep the momentum of the investigation going. It’s more efficient and cost effective. Part of this conference trained officers to be better and more efficient at collecting evidence for submission to the labs. In most cases, this leads to better information being returned to the officer more quickly than in the past.

The forensics wildlife field training conference has been running in Montana for five years thanks to Carlene Gonder, founder and executive director of Wildlife Field Forensics. As a former law enforcement officer with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and Wyoming Game and Fish and National Park Service, she saw a huge need for field forensics training for officers. “I looked for this kind of training when I was an officer and it didn’t exist,” she says.

After completing graduate research focused on time of death in wildlife, a technique that assists officers in finding suspects and bringing culprits to justice, Gonder saw value in presenting her information to field officers. She teamed up with other experts in the area of wildlife forensics and the conference was born.

The event has grown each year, and this past summer it came to Lethbridge thanks to a former Lethbridge College environmental science student. Rob Harmer, now a conservation officer in Nunavut, saw Gonder speak at a North American Wildlife Enforcement Officers Association conference in 2009. He was fascinated by her work. He learned of her field training seminar in Montana and invited Orr to attend with him in 2010. Orr became hooked on the idea and immediately started talking with Gonder about bringing the seminar to Lethbridge for Canadian officers.

It’s often difficult to find money in federal and provincial enforcement budgets to send officers for out-of-province training, let alone international training. Bringing this training to Canada is immensely beneficial. Enforcement officers from the following agencies came to Lethbridge: Parks Canada, Environment Canada, Alberta Fish and Wildlife, Saskatchewan Environment, Nunavut Department of Environment and the Pennsylvania Game Commission. Parks Canada currently has 82 full-time enforcement officers; 10 of them attended the field forensics seminar in Lethbridge. Orr says that is a testament to how valuable the training is and how committed the federal department is to ensuring the best training for its employees. Orr says, “I feel this is the best hands-on field training I have seen in a long, long time.”

Topics at the training session included firearms, fish time of death, decomposition analysis, forensic entomology, crime scene management and evidence collection. Orr says, “The information they are getting in some cases is very simple, but nobody has thought of it before. It makes sense to do it.”

Bryan Poll, an Alberta Fish and Wildlife Officer stationed in Red Deer and environmental science alumnus from 2002, was excited for the opportunity to tweak his field and investigation skills. “This is the first time I’ve had this type of training,” he says. “We have courses that highlight these areas, but nothing that’s ever gone into this kind of detail with access to literature and the specialists that are here.”

Enforcement officers in Canada do an important job. There is a lot of intrinsic value to having wildlife run free. Orr believes most Canadians care a great deal about our fish and wildlife. “Most people feel that we have an obligation to our future generations to ensure they have what we have,” he says. This is why our governments have hired a specific group of enforcement officers to protect our fish and wildlife. Our society puts so much value on our environment and the critters that live in it. “It’s part of who we are as Canadians and Albertans. We want things protected,” he says.

Officers take pride in their roles and actively seek training to be the best they can be. The wildlife field forensics training program is exactly what they need. Orr looks forward to offering it for many years to come. In fact, he’s already started planning for next year.

Wider Horizons
Megan Shapka
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