High school students learn from police at forensic investigations camp at Indiana University Northwest
Investigators with the Gary, Indiana, Police Department are used to encountering crime scenes — but they aren't in the habit of creating a fake one for students most of the time.
But at a unique summer camp at Indiana University Northwest, they did just that this week.
Crime scene tape was strung up around a room, along with footprints, handprints, and a gun at the scene. Chairs and desks were tipped over, and evidence markers of the type used for shell casings were placed around the room.
There was also a body lying flat with blood on the shirt and forehead. But this body belonged to a dummy.
While crime scene was not real, there was still a mystery to solve.
Lucy Trust was among the students working to solve the mystery in that room on Thursday. She does not get grossed out easily — saying she does "fine" with such scenes.
Trust traveled to Indiana University Northwest in Gary all the way from Pittsburgh.
"I am learning a lot," she said.
The 17-year-old was one of more than a dozen high school students enrolled in a four-day forensic investigations camp at the university.
"We don't do this every day, nope," said Gary police Lt. Brian Farrow. "But it's fun."
Crime scene investigators from the Gary Police Department set up the mock crime scene, and walked the students through a thorough investigation.
"It's really way more tedious than I thought," said Trust.
The teens learned to take crime scene photos, bag evidence, and uncover blood spatter using UV light.
"I really enjoy all of the hands-on work and meeting like all of the professionals," Trust said.
The camp is free and open to all.
"If they have a passion for it at this young age, they're going to very successful in life," said Farrow.
IU Northwest associate professor Monica Solinas-Saunders said the university is hoping to recruit more students to the camp — and she is especially proud to see so many young women.
"If we recruit more women, then we might be able to solve more of the crimes that are affecting young women, especially — as we know, sexual assault and rape are crimes that are often not reported because the prosecution is so difficult," said Solinas-Saunders.
For some, the camp could be the first step in a career.
"If I'm going to be in the FBI and I'm going to be an agent, this is part of it, and I need to learn it, and it's very interesting," said Trust, "and I love it."
It is a good reason to return to the scene of a crime, as it were.
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CNN
30 minutes ago
- CNN
‘We are not safe in America today:' These American citizens say they were detained by ICE
Federal agencies Immigration National security Race & ethnicityFacebookTweetLink Follow Elzon Lemus is always on the road for work, traveling from one place to another. But ever since federal immigration officers pulled the electrician over as he was driving to his first job of the day earlier this month in Nassau County, New York, Lemus has been on high alert, limiting his travel around town out of fear, he said — despite being a US citizen. On June 3, Lemus says he was briefly detained during a traffic stop by federal agents because he resembled someone the agents were looking for, they told him and video from the encounter shows. Lemus' arrest, and other reports of American citizens being detained by immigration officials, highlights growing concerns over racial profiling and constitutional rights — for both the documented and undocumented — as the Trump administration's broad mass deportation crackdown takes aim at people of all ages from children and families to suspected criminals by detaining people outside courtroom hearings, during traffic stops and in workplace sweeps. It's not legal for US Immigration and Customs Enforcement to arrest and detain US citizens, CNN legal analyst Joey Jackson said. But under certain circumstances, immigration officers can arrest citizens without a warrant if they witness an 'offense against the United States' or a felony offense — otherwise, their powers are regulated to immigration matters, according to federal law. Lemus and his coworker had just left their boss' home earlier this month when they were pulled over by officers, he told CNN. With Lemus' coworker at the wheel of their work vehicle and the 23-year-old in the passenger seat, agents approached their windows simultaneously and asked for identification, without providing any of their own, Lemus said. 'You look like someone we're looking for,' the agent says to Lemus, video of the incident shows. Lemus declined to show identification several times. If we don't get your ID, then we're going to have to figure out another way to ID you and that may not work out well for you,' the officer speaking with Lemus says on video. Lemus said he was handcuffed and searched for at least 25 minutes until officers found his identification before he was released. The electrician believes he was pulled over because he and his coworker look Hispanic, a community that has often been targeted by Trump's mass deportation efforts. Under the Fourth Amendment, Americans are protected from random searches unless law enforcement has probable cause to believe they're involved in criminal activity. Department of Homeland Security Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin, in a statement to CNN, denied that Lemus was arrested or detained by ICE, and said he was not 'even searched or ever placed in handcuffs.' The video made available to CNN cuts off after Lemus exits the vehicle and does not show whether he was searched or handcuffed. 'The facts are ICE conducted a targeted enforcement operation to arrest an (sic) criminal illegal alien with a prior conviction of assault. An individual matching the criminal illegal alien's description exited the surveilled location and got into a vehicle. For public safety, ICE law enforcement pulled over the vehicle and requested identification. Once it was confirmed that the criminal illegal alien was not in the car, Lemus and the driver of the vehicle were thanked for their cooperation and informed they were free to go,' the DHS statement reads. 'Because of the color of their skin, the accent in their voice or their ethnicity, people are being demanded to show their papers for no good reason,' Lemus' attorney, Fred Brewington, said during a news conference. 'With no probable cause, without reasonable suspicion,' he added, saying the targeting was 'reminiscent' of when Germany was under Adolf Hitler's dictatorship and people were required to carry identification with them at all times, a comparison Minnesota Governor Tim Walz made last month. Walz came under fire for likening the actions of ICE under the Trump administration to the Gestapo, the secret police force of Nazi Germany. ICE will often detain individuals who they have probable cause to believe are undocumented, or if agents have a warrant to execute, then leave the rest of their fate to the courts, legal analyst Jackson said. 'Due process not only starts with giving people notice and an opportunity to be heard and hearings and respecting their civil liberties, but it kind of starts with stopping people, because there's a basis to do it,' Jackson said. Nearly 3,000 miles away from Lemus on the opposite coast, Brian Gavidia has a similar story to tell. Gavidia was working at a tow yard on June 12 in Montebello, California, where nearly 80% of the population is Latino or Hispanic according to US Census data, when he heard immigration agents were outside, he told CNN affiliate KCAL. When he went outside himself, an agent approached him. Although he told the officers he was an American citizen three times, they detained and questioned him about what hospital he was born in while they held him up against a fence, he said and video of the incident shows. Gavidia said he couldn't sleep after the incident because even though an agent gave him his phone back after taking it away, he said, they never returned his Real ID. 'I am American,' he remembers telling an agent. 'I stated I was American. He still attacked me. We are not safe, guys, not safe in America today.' CNN has reached out to an attorney for Gavidia. The Department of Homeland Security said in a post on X that Gavidia was arrested because he assaulted US Border Patrol Agents, though the partial video attached to the post only shows him being held against the fence then handing his ID to the agents. In a statement to CNN, DHS said it was conducting a 'lawful immigration enforcement operation' when Gavidia 'attempted to flee, assaulting an agent in the process. The subject was arrested for assaulting and interfering with agents during their duties.' In the same operation, the tow yard's owner, Javier Ramirez, a single dad of two and a US citizen, was arrested and detained, his family told CNN affiliate KABC. Officials appeared to target him after he yelled out to his staff, 'ICE! Immigration,' when federal agents arrived on property. For hours after his detainment, Ramirez's family worried about his whereabouts as he was without his medication, Abimael Dominguez, his brother, told the station. CNN reached out to Dominguez. Video obtained by KABC shows only a portion of the incident and captures Ramirez sitting on the ground with his hands restrained behind his back. It's unclear what happened before or after the video. In a statement, DHS said 'Ramirez was detained on the street for investigation for interference and released after being confirmed to be a U.S. citizen with no outstanding warrants.' 'These men did exactly what they were supposed to do,' American Immigration Lawyers Association President Jeff Joseph said. 'They stated clearly that they were US citizens and ICE proceeded anyways. They did not resist. They calmly stated their rights and asserted their citizenship.' 'We've got a lot of danger here when you have raids that are not really thought out … just to meet a daily quota,' with US citizens getting caught in the crosshairs, Shira Scheindlin, a retired federal judge, told CNN's Pamela Brown last week. CNN has previously reported that the agency has been under pressure to meet quotas, with the White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller calling it a 'floor, not a ceiling.' When asked about the quotas and methodology used in immigration sweeps, McLaughlin, the DHS assistant secretary, told CNN, 'We are not going to disclose law enforcement sensitive intelligence and methods. 70% of the arrests ICE made were of criminal illegal aliens.' Just miles from where Gavidia and Ramirez were detained and days later, in neighboring Pico Rivera, California, 20-year-old Adrian Martinez was arrested by federal immigration agents following a physical altercation with them after a maintenance worker was detained at a shopping center. Martinez, a US citizen, was on a break from work at a nearby Walmart. In video from the incident, he appears to drag the detained man's equipment cart in front of the Border Patrol agent vehicle, blocking it from leaving. A CBP spokesperson said the detained man was undocumented. Videos from the confrontation show Border Patrol agents scuffling with Martinez, shoving him to the ground at least twice. Meanwhile, the maintenance worker had already been driven away by agents, according to Oscar Preciado, a delivery driver who captured some of the incident on video. In a statement to CNN, a CBP spokesperson said Martinez punched an agent in the face and struck another agent in the arm after 'agents were confronted by a hostile group.' The statement also says the videos 'are missing critical moments and don't tell the whole story.' 'U.S. Attorney Essayli and U.S. Border Patrol Sector Chief Gregory Bovino outrageously alleged that Adrian assaulted a federal agent. However he has not been charged with an assault charge because he didn't assault anyone, and the evidence of that is clear,' Martinez's legal team, Miller Law Group, said in a statement to CNN. No punch by Martinez is easily visible in three videos reviewed by CNN, including the surveillance footage that shows the entire encounter. An ICE directive from February 2025 requires ICE agents and officers to use body worn cameras — with exceptions such as when agents are undercover or on commercial flights — 'to capture footage of Enforcement Activities at the start of the activity or, if not practicable, as soon as safely possible thereafter.' Martinez was 'standing up' for the detained man, according to Preciado, but Joseph of the American Immigration Lawyers Association said while the desire to intervene is a very natural, human reaction, getting involved can cause further problems and fighting back 'is only going to get you into worse trouble,' he told CNN. 'And those are the charges that ultimately are going to stick,' he explained. '… if you get aggressive and interfere, those charges are likely going to stick, because there's going to be proof.' In May, acting ICE director Todd Lyons released a statement saying, 'obstructing federal law enforcement officers in the performance of their duties is a crime that jeopardizes public safety and national security.' After he spent three days in detention, the assault charges against Martinez were dropped and 'he has been charged with conspiracy to impede or injure an officer, a felony,' according to his attorney. Martinez's legal team called the charge 'trumped up' in a statement, saying it was 'filed to justify the federal agents' violent treatment of Adrian.' A judge ordered his release from federal custody on a $5,000 bond, his attorney announced on Friday, sharing that Martinez is home and recovering after needing medical care for abrasions and bruising across his body from the altercation. The anxiety that Lemus and others said they now carry with them as they try to resume their everyday lives isn't unique to their experience with federal immigration agents. 43% of Latino voters think others may fear immigration authorities will arrest people, even if they are US citizens, UnidosUs, the nation's largest Hispanic civil rights and advocacy organization, found. Jackson said with the Trump administration's broad immigration enforcement tactics, 'everything that's happening right now kind of offends the sensibilities of what you learn in law school.' As for Lemus, every car that even remotely resembles the SUV the agents drove that day gives him pause, he said, noting he still doesn't know who the officers were, nearly a month after the incident. 'It just shows that even citizens don't got rights,' Lemus said, adding his friends and family are concerned that 'even though they were born here, they also think that it could happen to them too.' CNN's Taylor Galgano contributed to this report.
Yahoo
39 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Boy, 14, Ate Lunch in Teacher's Classroom Because He Had 'Issues Fitting In.' Now She's Accused of Drawing Curtains and Raping Him
Sarah Jacas allegedly molested and then raped a student over the course of multiple months when the 14-year-old boy started eating lunch in her classroom The teacher allegedly created a Instagram account to contact the student Police arrested Jacas on June 23 and charged her with battery, molestation and statutory rapeA Florida teacher is facing a litany of charges after she allegedly raped a middle school student in her classroom. The Orange County Sheriff's Office arrested Sarah Jacas, 32, earlier this week on multiple counts of lewd or lascivious battery and lewd or lascivious molestation as well as a single count of statutory rape by an authority figure, according to an arrest warrant obtained by PEOPLE. The alleged victim, now 16, spoke with deputies from the Orange County Sheriff's Office on June 10 and alleged that Jacas had sexually abused him in 2023 when the then-14-year-old attended Corner Lake Middle School. Jacas and the alleged victim began having lunch together in her classroom at the start of the 2022-23 school year "because he had issues fitting in and associating with the right crowd," according to a copy of the affidavit for arrest warrant, which was obtained by PEOPLE. The alleged victim told investigators that he and Jacas grew closer during these lunches, but alleged that she began to "isolate" him from other students over time. He also said that the two began to express physical affection for each other, but alleged that what started off as chaste hugs and kisses on the check soon grew into what the affidavit alleges was molestation. According to the affidavit, Jacas and the alleged victim would text outside of school hours. But one time, at 1 a.m., the boy's mother caught them exchanging messages and instructed both to stop texting, saying it was "abnormal," the affidavit alleges. The educator stopped texting but also allegedly created a fake Instagram account where she would 'dirty talk' with the alleged victim, the affidavit claims, further alleging that she wrote, "I just had sex with my husband and it wasn't the best but I imagined it was you.' A week before Spring Break in 2023, the alleged victim told deputies that Jacas covered the windows of her classroom with active assailant curtains, laid a pillow in the corner and had sexual intercourse with him. Jacas allegedly did not provide the boy with protection, according to the affidavit. Jacas allegedly sexually abused the boy each day before Spring Break, but after the break commenced, Jacas' husband — with whom she shares a son — learned about his wife's alleged behavior, according to the affidavit. Subsequently, the husband posed as Jacas and contacted the teen on Jacas' secret social media account, the affidavit alleges. Want to keep up with the latest crime coverage? Sign up for for breaking crime news, ongoing trial coverage and details of intriguing unsolved cases. "[Jacas] called [the alleged victim] from an unknown number and told [the alleged victim] her husband found out about their relationship and for [the alleged victim] to 'lay low' because her husband" was angry, Deputy Sheriff Kyle Cole wrote in the affidavit. The alleged victim told deputies that in the remaining weeks of the school year, Jacas did not return to school. On June 16, the alleged victim allegedly called Jacas on the phone — in the presence of law enforcement. (Details of the phone conversation were redacted from the affidavit.) Jacas has not yet entered a plea and the public defender representing her did not respond to a request for comment, She was booked into custody on June 23 and made her first court appearance the following day. On June 25, Jacas was released from the Orange County Detention Facility after posting bail. The principal at Corner Lake Middle School reached out to students' families after Jacas' arrest and said "there is an ongoing investigation by law enforcement and the district's Office of Professional Standards" and that "this person will not be returning to campus pending the outcome of the investigation." If you or someone you know has been a victim of sexual abuse, text "STRENGTH" to the Crisis Text Line at 741-741 to be connected to a certified crisis counselor. If you or someone you know has been sexually assaulted, please contact the National Sexual Assault Hotline at 1-800-656-HOPE (4673) or go to . Read the original article on People
CNN
41 minutes ago
- CNN
Where is Jodi Huisentruit?
She was the darling of local morning television in Mason City, Iowa — not as glamorous as it might sound, since that meant arriving for work at 3 a.m. Despite the daily incredibly early arrival time for the morning broadcast, Jodi Huisentruit had never missed a show, not once. On June 27, 1995, she finally overslept. 'I'll be right in,' she said when her news producer called to wake her up at 4 a.m. Huisentruit lived alone in a small apartment complex in Mason City just about a mile from work. The Long Prairie, Minnesota, native was the youngest of three daughters. She excelled in sports early, and especially loved golf. Before starting her career as a journalist, she worked briefly as a Northwest Airlines flight attendant. A friend remembers that she liked to say that she wanted to be 'on the air, not in the air.' That morning, when she still didn't show up at the station, 'the assumption Jodi's coworkers had was she had probably fallen back asleep,' investigative journalist Caroline Lowe said. With Huisentruit missing, the station's producer anchored the 6 a.m. broadcast. But then, with still no sign of the newscaster, the station asked the police department to go check on her. Police didn't find the 27-year-old Huisentruit, but they did find disturbing signs of her absence. 'When police got to the scene, there was no sign of Jodi, but her car was there. There were definite signs of a struggle' — such as a bent car key, Lowe said, that 'indicated that she was probably attacked from behind and there was a lot of force used. And then on the ground, you see her stuff strewn like her red heels, her blow dryer, earrings.' 'There were drag marks in the parking lot,' said Brian Mastre, who was Huisentruit's KIMT-TV coworker at the time, and 'her items in her purse, because she was running late, were scattered in the parking lot.' But that was nearly it. Her building had no security cameras. Police found no witnesses, and no blood. Jodi Huisentruit hasn't been seen since. What's unusual about her case is that, 30 years later, a devoted team of volunteers, like Caroline Lowe, is still trying to solve the mystery. New and old leads are being evaluated — and, far from Mason City, grim excavations in hopes of finding Huisentruit's body are still being conducted. Mason City is on its fourth police chief since the disappearance. Current Police Chief Jeff Brinkley says that tips continue to 'come in consistently throughout the year,' and that his investigators are doing their part to 'further the investigation.' 'Obviously, things pick up a little bit this time of year as we near an anniversary, but we do regularly get communication from various people in the community and around the country with ideas and information about Jodi's case,' Brinkley said. Huisentruit gave indications she was concerned about her safety well before her disappearance. In October 1994, nearly nine months before she went missing, Huisentruit filed this police report regarding a 'suspicious subject' who was 'following her, driving a small white newer pickup.' She had also taken a self defense class. The day before she disappeared, Huisentruit played in a charity golf tournament. There, she told some of her fellow players that she was considering changing her phone number after receiving harassing phone calls. 'Her schedule was public, and she had the same schedule every day. Her information, where she lived, her phone number, home address were in the phone book,' Lowe said. 'So that would have been very easy for a stalker.' Over the years, police have looked at numerous people who may have been connected to Huisentruit's disappearance. John Vansice was one of them. He and Huisentruit ran in the same social circle, though he was 22 years older. He told police she'd been at his place the night before she disappeared. They had watched videos from a recent birthday party that he helped organize for the news anchor. Police remained interested in Vansice though he was never named a suspect or charged. 'From day one, John Vansice claimed he cared about Jodi. He consistently denied any involvement in Jodi's abduction,' said Lowe. In 2017, investigators attached GPS mobile tracking devices to two vehicles connected to Vansice. He also complied with a court order to provide DNA, fingerprints and palm prints to the FBI. The tracking, though, seemed to provide nothing. Some of the information gained from this exploration was unsealed in April this year; some, for reasons yet unknown, was not. 'Mere curiosity is never a sufficient reason for potentially interfering in an ongoing criminal investigation, especially of a major crime,' the presiding judge wrote about the release, in response to a public records request brought by Iowa attorneys who argued the public has an interest in knowing. Chief Brinkley declined to comment when asked if Vansice had been officially ruled out as having had anything to do with Huisentruit's disappearance. Vansice maintained his innocence until the day he died, in December 2024. Police do have a few things. 'We've got a palm print in evidence,' Chief Brinkley said — and the department still has Huisentruit's belongings that were collected at the scene, he said. The print was found on Huisentruit's car. But whose palm print is it? That's the great frustrating unknown at the heart of this case. After receiving a tip in October, Mason City investigators worked with police in Winsted, Minnesota, to search near a farm construction area. They found only animal bones. 'We didn't find any remains,' Brinkley told CNN. 'There was nothing else gained from the search.' But a few months later, a member of the Mason City Police met with a Wisconsin Sheriff to compare notes and revisit leads related to a man named Christopher Revak. He had been linked to two other cases with female victims; his potential involvement in this case had previously been dismissed. 'It's something that we're reviewing,' Brinkley said. What spurred their fresh interest? Revak's first wife, they learned, had lived in Mason City at the time Jodi disappeared. (The wife is not considered a suspect.) 'There's a probable cause standard here. There's got to be evidence that supports those things in any direction that we would go in terms of an indictment, or, you know, closing the case, those kinds of things. And so, when that evidence is clear and, and we can move in a direction, then we'll do that,' Brinkley said. Revak, also, is dead. He died from suicide in a Missouri jail in 2009, while charged with second-degree murder of a woman. Soon enough, few with direct knowledge of Huisentruit's disappearance or its suspects will be left alive. Will the case be solved before then? 'I do feel a sense of momentum right now,' Lowe said. 'I can't explain it, but it's been a lot of activity in the past year between the court case and the search and the interview in Wisconsin, and that's kept things going,' 'But,' she said, 'I feel like I say that every year.' For her and her colleagues who are trying to solve the case themselves, the developments that don't work out keep them on an emotional roller coaster. 'I don't want to be back doing the same thing,' she said. Brian Mastre, formerly the evening news anchor on KIMT, had worked with Jodi. He can still feel the anxiety and shock as if it were yesterday. One surreal element of the case is that Huisentruit's coworkers had to cover the news of the disappearance as it was unfolding. Mastre wrote a two-page script for that evening's broadcast. He kept it, of course. Here, he read it aloud again, nearly 30 years later. 'I thought I would bring it back and maybe somebody remembers, and it takes them back, and it jogs their memory,' Mastre told CNN. Now a news anchor and investigative reporter at WOWT-TV in Omaha, Nebraska, Mastre says that nothing could have prepared him or his team for having to report on the disappearance of a beloved colleague. 'It was just crazy, trying to get the story and figuring out what happened, swarmed by other stations doing the same things, FBI and DCI' — that's the Iowa Division of Criminal Investigation — 'interviewing us while we're trying to write a show,' Mastre said. 'We were trying to get information from them, and they were trying to get information from us.' He said he is surprised that nobody has slipped up over the years to reveal any secrets that would lead to any answers. 'She is one of ours. I feel we owe it to her as part of our family. I want to bring her home,' said Caroline Lowe. She spent 34 years as a reporter for WCCO-TV in Minneapolis. After leaving the station, Lowe was on special assignment for KARE-11. There, she covered the Jacob Wetterling abduction case, which became a national story. It took nearly three decades for an arrest to be made in the killing of the 11-year-old, and the case was solved after Wetterling had been missing for 27 years, with the suspect eventually admitting to the abduction and killing in court. The Wetterling case shows that even the coldest of cases can eventually be solved — with luck, and with legwork. Lowe is part of a larger community of journalists who have zealously worked on the case. In 2003, journalist Josh Benson, then a reporter and anchor at KAAL-TV in Austin, Minnesota, co-founded the group, 'Find Jodi,' along with his news director at KAAL-TV, Gary Peterson. Other members of the group include Brian Wise, a photojournalist formerly with KAAL-TV in Rochester, Minnesota and Scott Fuller, the General Manager of a media company in Wyoming. The nonprofit group also places billboards around Mason City for Huistentruit's birthdays and for the grim anniversaries of her disappearance. This year, the group has a billboard on display on Highway 122, across from the Mason City Municipal Airport. It has an image of Huisentruit and reads simply '30 years. It's time.' Thirty years ago, it was an 11-year-old named Kristen who answered the phone when police called to tell the family that Huisentruit had gone missing. (She asked that CNN not disclose her last name for her safety; she currently runs a Facebook page for the family.) 'The phone rang, and I answered, and they ID'd themselves as the Mason City Police. They recognized I was a kid and asked for my mom and my dad.' She recalled watching her father. 'I remember his face when he took the call, I knew it wasn't good, I saw his face drop.' 'At 11 years old, I didn't have any concept of what 'missing' meant,' she said. 'I didn't understand an adult going missing.' It's stuck with her all these decades. 'You don't move on; it becomes a part of you; it's always with you,' she said. 'This is an ambiguous loss; we don't have any answers or justice in the case.' Chief Brinkley told CNN he's still hopeful police will solve the case. 'Under the right set of circumstances, it could be any day,' he said. 'Whether it's DNA, whether it's a confession, there are one hundred different ways that this could go.'
