Persistence of Pollen on Clothing Evidence

Traditionally, forensic palynology, a branch of forensic botany, has been utilized during the investigation of crimes to link a suspect or victim to a particular place. This is done by identifying pollen and spores collected from objects, clothing, and/or bodies and comparing the identification to the plants documented at the scene of a crime. Pollen and spores both, as a form of trace evidence, can be identifiable through analysis of their morphology and have been documented to be resistant to destruction. It is also documented that criminals are willing to tamper with evidence to hinder criminal investigations, in the hopes of preventing or delaying their identification. Determining whether pollen evidence can be recovered from clothing evidence that has been tampered with would be a boon to forensic palynology, and the field of forensic botany as a whole. Two relatively common methods of tampering with clothing evidence include washing the clothing and destroying it by burning. With this in mind, this study was designed to determine whether pollen evidence can persist through the washing and/or the burning of clothing evidence by criminals attempting to obstruct justice and remain on the streets. Based upon previous documentation and experimentation, it was expected that any pollen or spores collected on clothing would persist through burning and continue to be identifiable. It was also expected that washing would remove a majority of pollen or spores present, if not all of them, and prevent linking the owner of the clothes to a particular crime scene. While this research would benefit from continued experimentation over a longer period of time, it shows that pollen evidence could be recovered from evidence that has been tampered with and identified as is usually done in a forensic palynological analysis. The form of tampering resulting in the highest chances of recovering palynological evidence utilized in this study was demonstrated to be burning, as washing resulted in no observation of pollen.