The Anatomy of a Criminal Investigation
Criminologists, despite devoting considerable attention to policing, tend to ignore one of its most important functions – criminal investigations. Approximately 16 % of law enforcement personnel are involved in such investigations and their success or failure plays a major role in the public’s image of the police. This scholarly lacuna is even more surprising given the gateway position of detectives and police investigators : unless a crime is solved and an individual arrested, the entire remainder of the criminal justice system – prosecutors, defense attorneys, judges, juries, probation, jails, prisons, parole, rehabilitation – does not come into play. The research that has explored investigations has been interested primarily in the organizational and technical aspects of detective work. I take a different approach by exploring the anatomy of a criminal investigation – the underlying structure of what is required, what is done, how it fails, and how it can be improved. Specific areas of interest include the functional phases of an investigation, the definition and nature of evidence, and the systemic structure of criminal investigative failures. The Gail Miller-David Milgaard murder investigation is used as a case study.