Episode
Forensic Files: Crash Course
Overview
A highway patrolman was dispatched to what he thought would be a routine traffic accident until he looked in the car. While he had no formal training in forensic science, he had seen hundreds of accidents – but never as much blood as this. He was shocked by the coroner's ruling of accidental death, and then an anonymous phone call breathed new life into his investigation.
Details
- Series
- Forensic Files
- Season
- Season 10
- Episode
- Episode 13
- Air date
- 2005-08-31
- Runtime
- 23 min
Episode context
Crash Course is Episode 13 in Season 10 of Forensic Files. It aired on 2005-08-31. The runtime is 23 min.
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Episode 12: Cereal Killer
When a fire destroyed most of a home and a young boy went missing, police organized the largest search in the history of their small town. First the boy's backpack was discovered five miles from home, and then his body was found 50 miles away. But the killer had been careless, and the evidence he left behind would lead police directly to him.
Episode 14: A Leg Up on Crime
The decomposed body of a young woman was discovered in a Bakersfield irrigation canal. If there was trace evidence, it had been washed away. Another victim was found in that same canal a year later; this time, the perpetrator had been careless. The shoe prints found at the scene would lead police to the most unlikely of killers.
More episodes from this season
Episode 11: Strong Impressions
The wife of an Air Force officer was found dead in her bed, with a plastic laundry bag near her face. At first glance, it appeared she'd been doing laundry, fell asleep, rolled onto the bag, and suffocated. But further investigation proved that the scene had been staged. Her death wasn't an accident; it was cold-blooded murder.
Episode 15: Tight-Fitting Genes
A behavioral profile is helpful in a murder investigation, but it's not a road map to the killer. One such profile caused the Baton Rouge Police Department to search for the wrong man. They might not have made an arrest, had it not been for a DNA picture of the suspect, painted by a molecular biologist. [also marked as S10:E15]
Episode 10: Tagging a Suspect
Bombings are difficult to solve, because the perpetrator isn't usually at the scene, and the evidence goes up in smoke. But there are clues if investigators know where to look. In this case pieces of plastic the size of grains of sand, held the key to a man's murder.
Episode 16: Deadly Valentine
An obstetrician returned home from the hospital and found his wife on the floor of the bathroom. She was covered with blood and not breathing. He tried unsuccessfully to revive her, staining his clothes with her blood in the process, and then he called 911. His version of events was not supported by the blood spatter evidence, and investigators had to determine why. [also marked as S10:E17]
Episode 9: Shear Luck
In 1991, when the wife of a serviceman was brutally murdered in the Philippines, the Air Force Office of Special Investigators swung into action. Clues led to the victim's husband, but he insisted he was innocent. To find out if he was telling the truth, investigators would have to do something unprecedented: Reassemble a 5-1/4 inch computer disk which had been cut to pieces with pinking shears.
Episode 17: Picture This
A Modesto, CA, teenager went missing. There was no sign of a struggle in her home, and police suspected she'd simply run away until her naked, bruised body was discovered in a ditch 20 miles away. [also marked as S7:E18]
Episode 8: Army of Evidence
A mother of two young children was found dead in her bedroom. It appeared she had killed herself: There were suicide notes near her body, and a pistol was in her hand. Her death was ruled a suicide – but when investigators learned she had almost died in a house fire three years earlier, they decided to take another look at the evidence.
Episode 18: Oily in the Morning
When police recovered the submerged car of a man reported missing, they expected to find his body – but it wasn't there. His broken eyeglasses were on the floor of the vehicle and the interior was coated with motor oil. The investigation which followed would uncover an obsession turned deadly, and the motive for murder. [also marked as S10:E19]
Episode 7: One for the Road
A married couple decided to escape the cold of winter with a mini-vacation in Key West. The wife went missing, and police searched every square inch of the island; they found nothing but a pair of sandals which might have belonged to her. Then two important pieces of video surfaced, and investigators began to wonder if they should be searching for a missing person or a killer.
Episode 19: Gold Rush
Emergency dispatch received a call from a man who said his girlfriend shot and killed herself. Police found the victim in the caller's house, lying in a pool of blood with the gun next to her on the floor. The autopsy revealed that the gunshot wound was not self-inflicted and the evidence found on her body would give police a golden opportunity to catch her killer.