Profile

Hi, my name is Amy and my pronouns are she/her. I’m originally from Barnsley, South Yorkshire, but now I live in Wrexham, North Wales, with my dog Bella. She’s a 7 year old Springer Spaniel and is a trained search dog. I am a forensic science lecturer and specialise in forensic anthropology and archaeology which is the search, recovery and identification of human remains, specifically bones.

My dog Bella who is a trained search dog

I love to cook and particularly love baking. I watch the Great British Bake Off religiously and one day I would love to be on the show. I enjoy musical theatre and recently I was in a local production of ‘Made in Dagenham’ which is about equal rights for women in the workplace and is based on a true story!

The cast of Made in Dagenham, a show I was in recently

I am a Senior Lecturer in Forensic Science at Wrexham University where I teach students how to collect evidence from crime scenes, how to test that evidence in the laboratory and how to present that evidence to a courtroom so that they can go on to help solve crimes in the future. My background is in biology and I specialise in archaeology and anthropology which means I work a lot with dead bodies. It might seem a bit gruesome and scary but it is really important work.

A excavation cake I made for a friend

As well as teaching I do a lot of research. This mainly involves trying to find out more about what happens to people’s bodies after they die and figuring out how quickly they turn in to a skeleton. This means that I can help the police with casework. If people go missing or die as a result of a crime or natural disaster, I can help to find them and figure out what happened.  My role can be quite varied, from helping to plan a search strategy, to digging up a body from a grave or studying the skeleton afterwards to try and work out who it belonged to.

3 pigs skulls in various stages of decomposition

Most mornings I take my dog Bella out for a long walk. We also use this time to do some training as she is a search dog. I go out and hide things for her to then find. She’s very good at it and thinks it all a big game as when she gets it right she gets to play with her tennis ball. After training Bella is normally quite tired so she stays at home and naps while I go into the University. Although sometimes Bella does get to come with me so we can teach the students about search strategies!

Members of the search dog team I work with doing a training activity

Once I’m at the University I spend a little time in my office getting everything prepared for a day of teaching. My teaching covers lots of different subjects from fingerprint analysis to blood spatter investigation, from bones in the ground to bugs under a microscope. I spend a lot of time with students in the laboratory doing experiments but also in our Crime Scene House which we use to set up scenarios for the students to practice their skills.

3 students in crime scene suites practicing a finger tip search on the grass

As well as teaching I try to find some time to work in the bone lab where we clean and photograph bones that have been found locally. Most of these are very old and part of archaeological sites, sometimes they are animal bones and don’t need investigating further but often they are human and so I try to work out who they belonged to: are they male/female, were they old or young when they died, how tall were they and did they have any injuries we could see.

Me teaching a lesson on the human skeleton

Occasionally if there is a big case such as a murder or a mass disaster I might get called away from the University to help the police. Sometimes this is just for a short time to help them find a missing person or check to see if a skeleton that’s found is recent or historical. Although I have also been called away to work on bigger cases that lasted a number of weeks and even meant travelling abroad.

Students dust for fingerprints in the crime scene house