Colorado Mesa University Students Shaping How Crime is Fought

GRAND JUNCTION, Colo. (KKCO) - With crime on the rise there has been a greater need for those to combat it-that’s where Colorado Mesa University comes in.

CMU students are able to shape the way we fight crime through the programs offered to them. There are four disciplines through the university that students can focus on. Specific disciplines include forensic psychology, DNA sequencing, and even bone decay.

Melissa Connor, a professor of forensic anthropology at CMU, said students are able to apply what they’ve learned in classrooms and labs to something functional out in the field.

“We’ve got students in coroner’s offices all over the state and all over the country. We have students in crime labs.” Connor said.

Through programs such as the ones available at CMU we are able to see how the field of forensics is important not only to help solve crimes but it shapes our country’s justice system as well.

“It’s important in order that when you go to court, you have the best data that you can possibly have to present to the jury, so that you can find out what’s actually going on in that case, and you don’t send innocent people to jail and you don’t let guilty people go free.” Connor said.

All of this comes together so that students at CMU can one day bring the high number of cold cases down.