Estimation of stature and sex from foot and shoe dimensions

The increasing incidences of crime in day to day life has necessitated the identification of individuals become an important aspect. The various tools for identification includes fingerprints, lip prints etc. Footprints and shoe marks are one of the identification mark which is almost always present at the crime scene. So if any technique can be developed to use these as identification tools, it would be of immense help in investigation of cases. With this background, the present study was conducted to determine the sex and stature from foot and shoe dimensions as fragmentary remains and foot wear, left during a crime or disaster like bomb explosion. Foot and shoe outline of 150 subjects were taken and from these the various dimensions of foot and shoe outline were calculated and a relationship was established. A mathematical equation was also derived. The study observed that there was significant variation in the different parameters namely foot length, foot breadth, shoe length, shoe breadth and shoe number, in relation to stature and sex, the length parameter was more significant than the breadth parameter. The study also showed that the stature and sex could be established with fair accuracy from the foot and shoe dimensions. It was also seen that when both foot and shoe parameters were taken into consideration the standard error of estimate was less than considering each individually.