Glass Trace Evidence

Our experienced experts at Key Forensic Services are highly-adept at evaluating complex cases involving breaking / broken glass, while always maintaining their impartiality.

What happens if a window is broken at the point of entry in a burglary, or as a result of criminal damage, or if glass objects are broken during an assault?

If someone is close to breaking glass during any of those scenarios mentioned, tiny fragments of glass may be transferred on to their skin, hair and clothing.

At our forensic laboratories, our experts – who have many years’ experience working within the Criminal Justice landscape – are able to recover glass fragments and carry out physical and elemental tests to compare them to the control glass at the scene.

If the recovered glass fragments match the control glass, then the expert will decide on the strength of evidence based upon the number of matching fragments, the commonality of the control glass and the case circumstances.

Our experts are then able to provide court testimony once they have fully assessed their findings.

Within the Glass Service, Key Forensic Services provide:

  • Searching of submitted items to confirm and quantify the presence of glass
  • Identification and selection of samples suitable for analysis and subsequent examination and comparison, in accordance with the agreed examination strategy
  • Comparison between the control samples and the recovered samples to establish a link
  • Interpretation and justification of the degree of association between the compared samples
  • Assessment and interpretation of the significance of the findings in the context of the individual case circumstances
  • Provision of forensic reports in line with customer requirements, including expert witness statements appropriate for Criminal or Civil courts
  • The provision of expert court testimony
  • Scientific, technical advice and forensic training