Forensic explosives intelligence

Explosives are frequently encountered in forensic casework related to criminal and terrorist activities. A broad range of analytical techniques is used to detect and identify the wide variety of energetic compounds and its corresponding raw materials. Traditionally the focus has been on chemical identification, but there is a growing need for individualization to allow the forensic expert to assess whether materials are connected. Chemical profiling can study links between explosive samples (e.g., samples from a crime scene and samples from a location related to a specific person), and is mainly used to provide characteristic findings that support (or exclude) common source relationships between different evidence materials in forensic investigations. In this thesis the goal was to go beyond this traditional domain of evidence forensics by moving towards the domain of forensic intelligence and to develop chemical profiling and attribution methodologies which can provide tactical information in order to prevent and obstruct (additional) crimes and attacks with explosives before they can be executed (i.e., when perpetrators are still in a preparation phase). The main objective was to develop the next generation of tools to accurately reconstruct the preparation of explosive materials in terms of raw materials and synthesis conditions used, and to find chemical characteristics that, in the absence of reference materials, could provide leads to assist in the tactical investigation (i.e., finding perpetrators who are preparing criminal or terrorist activities with explosives).