Preliminary Investigations

After the crime is filed a preliminary investigation begins, this is performed by the law enforcement representatives to gather more information about the case. This is to determine whether or not a crime has been committed and to identify the subject(s)/identify the suspect’s identity. Using what they gain from the preliminary investigation a decision is made on whether to continue with the case or not. Whereas the follow-up investigation gives the investigators the opportunity to properly evaluate what evidence they have gained; evaluate interviews, interrogations, and collected evidence; determine the identity of the suspect(s), their current location and their reasoning for committing the crime. They will also collect and process evidence for the prosecutor and at the trial. The first attending officer is the one to take all of the witness statements and the Scenes of crime officers will be the ones to collect any evidence on the crime and store the evidence correctly. This stage is beneficial to the investigation as this is where the majority of evidence will be found that can be analysed and give answers, this can lead to possible suspects and builds the case.

For the preliminary investigation on Christine Jessop they interviewed the locals in the area at the time and checked up on their statements to make sure they were true, one of these was Guy Paul Morin who at the time of the disappearance was in work, however they targeted Guy Paul due to all his neighbours calling him an oddball and a weird typed guy. This caused the investigating officers to target Morin and make him main suspect. When searching for evidence they found a blanket it the boot of Guy Paul's car which had strands of what was believed to be fibres from the jumper Christine was wearing that day, they placed this evidence in the patrol car and left it there over the weekend, this could have caused contamination. This piece of evidence should have been logged and handed into the next link in the chain of custody. Had this piece of evidence been handed in sooner they would have been able to perform tests on the blanket to find out whether they matched the fibres, however they wouldn't have been able to compare the fibres until Christine was found, had the fibres not have matched they wouldn't have had any evidence on the case and the trial would have been acquitted. Once the body of Christine had been found her clothes, more importantly her knickers were stored. Traces of semen were found on her panties unfortunately the panties were stored in a locker in the wrong conditions, had the piece of evidence been correctly stored and tested they would have been able to get conclusive results that could have been used as evidence in court however it was incorrectly stored and wasn't tested immediately thus making the evidence inconclusive.