FBI Confidential

FBI Confidential


Evidence Response Team: the FBI's real-life CSI

June 21, 2018

FBI Special Agent Steve Daniels with the agency's Salt Lake City Division walks host Debbie Dujanovic through what the Evidence Response Team does. The agents who work with him are the FBI's equivalent of CSI, or crime scene investigators -- and while they have a lot of cool tools and technology at their disposal, it bears very little resemblance to the crime scene tech you see on TV. Agent Daniels explains how the FBI processes a crime scene, from taking photographs and lifting fingerprints to identifying possible bodily fluids (including blood) or solvents and cleaners. His team has been called in to help process scenes from the Harvest 91 Festival shooting in Las Vegas to the recovery efforts after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, in New York City. Locally, their work helped tie the suspects in the kidnapping and murder of Utah Transit Authority employee Kay Ricks to the multiple crime scenes that were involved. Sometimes, the work leads to justice for victims of crimes. But other times, it's more about closure and answers for those who want to know what happened to their loved ones.