DNA Establishes Legal Paternity Quickly And Accurately

Most of us today take for granted that paternity testing can be proved through scientific means. This has not always been true. There once was a time when a lie could not be proven false or true and eyewitnesses motivated by high moral standings or in the depths of personally guided misspeaking were taken as gospel truth. Legal Paternity Testing The Old Way The most popular way for determining paternity was a judge standing a child (sitting or lying) next to an accused father, taking a good hard look and then making a determination. The coincidental fact that each person may have the same hair and eye color, the same shaped face and other.......................... READ FULL ARTICLE

The Many Faces Of DNA Testing

DNA testing is something many of us are only familiar with from TV police shows, but there are a wide range of different applications for DNA testing, all of which are used for the same reason as in criminal investigations. Testing for genetic markers is a reliable means of determining the identity of people based on a sample, such as in paternity testing. How many different kinds of DNA testing are there? Quite a few, as it happens and in this article, we will cover a few of the most common. Paternity Testing: Before DNA testing became the standard practice for paternity testing, blood group testing was the rule. While this method was rel.......................... READ FULL ARTICLE

Hints On Prenatal Testing

There is the so called prenatal paternity test for those who need to know the paternal relationship before the child is born. But by definition under medical parlance, prenatal testing is the process applied to test for diseases or conditions in a fetus or embryo before it is born. It is more aimed at determining birth defects or abnormalities before delivery. In this process, the screening can likewise determine the sex or gender of the fetus. In some cases, the tests are administered to determine if the fetus will be aborted. Either way, this is very important because parents would know what to do under the circumstances. That way, they .......................... READ FULL ARTICLE

Legal Paternity: Perspectives

Under the law, legal paternity is the acknowledgment of the parental relationship between a man and a child. In common law, a child born to the wife during a marriage is the husband's child, pursuant to the so called presumption of lawful paternity. The husband or father then is vested with complete rights, duties and obligations with respect to the child. This presumption nevertheless can be refuted by contrary evidence. Jurisdictions differ widely on when a judgment establishing paternity or a support obligation based on the presumption can be set aside on the grounds that the husband was not in fact the father. In this particular juris.......................... READ FULL ARTICLE

Forensic Science Career Choices: What will it take

Are you someone who has been fascinated with the use of science to catch criminals, or do you have a analytical bent that you feel could be of service to people pursuing the course of justice? If so, you may find that it is time for you to look into chasing a career in forensics. Though forensics can refer to any branch of science that is applied to learn more in a legal setting, you will find that most people will turn to the idea of crime scene investigations. The career of crime scene investigator is seeing a lot of changes, and you might find that this is the career for you. Essentially, when looking at the role of a crime scene invest.......................... READ FULL ARTICLE

The Hows and Whys of Forensic Science

by James Gilbert Pynn The relatively new field of forensic science has radically changed the way law enforcement officials build their cases. Modern crime fighting is now the convergence of law enforcement, the judicial system, and science. Subsequently, it has changed the way policing in general and investigations specifically are conducted. Being caught red-handed need not mean at the scene or even hours later. In some cases, forensic science has solved cases decades after the fact. During the late 1700s, the field we now associate with forensic science began to emerge from various scientific endeavors that evolved over the previous.......................... READ FULL ARTICLE