New hope for dog victims of crime!!
The University of Florida, beginning in January 2010 will begin a program that will be a first in the nation. It will be one of the country’s first veterinary forensics sciences program at a major university. What does this mean? That crimes against animals, will now be able to be investigated and hopefully solved in a way that has never existed before.
Dogs rarely have a voice when they are victims of a crime. According to Melinda Merck, senior director of veterinary forensics for the ASPCA, “These crimes are evidence-based. We have a victim who cannot testify, so I have to be their voice,” Currently Merck lives in Atlanta, but she will be moving to Gainsville to teach classes and investigate animal abuse in the new program.
The courses offered will not just be for undergraduate and graduate students. There will be continuing education courses for people in law enforcement, animal control as well as for current veterinarians.
Many of the things that are currently part of human crime scene investigations will now be part of this curriculum. For example, the study of insects in decaying bodies — remains excavation, blood spatter pattern analysis, bite-mark analysis and animal crime scene processing will be studied. I didn’t realize that blood splatter in animals is different than it is in humans. There are few animal cruelty investigators and this program will help to increase the number of these types of officers.
The ASPCA and the University of Florida began working together over a year ago when they offered a conference on animal cruelty. Only a couple dozen people were expected, but over 200 attended. It was definitely time to put the program in place.
Maybe now, the dogs and other animals that suffer at the hands of criminals will finally have justice.
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