Forensic Disciplines and Methods

Criminalistics

Citation Formats

General Reference

Crime and Justice Atlas. "Criminalistics." Accessed August 30, 2026. https://crime.interactiveatlas.org/forensic-disciplines/criminalistics.

APA Style

Crime and Justice Atlas. (n.d.). Criminalistics. Retrieved August 30, 2026, from https://crime.interactiveatlas.org/forensic-disciplines/criminalistics

BibTeX

@misc{crimeandjusticeatlas-criminalistics,
  author = {Crime and Justice Atlas},
  title = {Criminalistics},
  year = {2026},
  url = {https://crime.interactiveatlas.org/forensic-disciplines/criminalistics},
  note = {Accessed August 30, 2026}
}

The application of scientific method to the recognition, collection and analysis of physical evidence, established as a discipline by Hans Gross and given its founding principle by Edmond Locard, that every contact leaves a trace.

Facts

What It Examinesthe subject's own account

Physical evidence of all kinds recovered from a crime scene, examined under Locards exchange principle that contact between two objects transfers material between them. 1

Formalized Yearthe subject's own account

1910 1

Known Limitation

The 2009 National Academy of Sciences report found that the forensic science disciplines gathered under criminalistics vary widely in their scientific foundation, and that several pattern-matching methods had not been validated by rigorous statistical research. 2

Cross-Tradition Connections