Word: wictum
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...forensics lab was established in 1999 out of necessity. The university's genetics lab, which specializes in verifying horses' lineages, was getting more forensic requests than it could handle. "Police labs are only set up to do human work, and they were overwhelmed with that," Wictum says. "If they had animal evidence, they would just set it aside...
...insurance companies (typically trying to identify animals that caused property damage) and private citizens (usually wanting to know if the remains found by a road belong to their lost pet or whether the neighbor's dog killed their cat). "For many people, pets are part of the family," says Wictum. "You want an answer. You want justice...
...samples seized from rustlers; these days he tends to get confessions as soon as suspects learn DNA tests will be ordered. For the same reason, it's rare than an animal- abuse case referred to the lab ever makes it to court. "Once you have the DNA analysis," says Wictum, "people end up pleading...
That doesn't make working on those cases any easier for Wictum and her colleagues. They remember the names of animals that have been fatally abused and refer to the people who do it as "serial killers." Kun, a mother of two, finds cases involving children as victims particularly difficult. "When I got samples for a case where a 6-year-old was mauled by dogs, I was glad I was alone in the lab," says...
...Texans sent samples of what they were convinced was a chupacabra--a legendary hairless beast that drains the blood of its prey. "We don't do that kind of work, but they submitted it in a roundabout way, so we didn't know what they were looking for," says Wictum. The chupacabra turned out to be a very mangy coyote...