History Main / GPSEvidence

* Not uncommon in Ellis Peter's ''[[{{Cadfael}} Brother Cadfael]]'' novels. In "The Leper at St. Giles", Cadfael discovers traces of three different varieties of plants on a corpse, and surmises that the body was murdered in an area where all three plants grow closely together.

* Intelligence agents have attempted (with little success currently) to locate Osama bin Laden by analysing the background in his videos. They actually succeeded during the Afgan war. However, the Geologist consulted didn't keep his mouth shut, and from then on any tapes smuggled out (and there is a dispute whether Osama is even alive and/or producing them) carefully conceal any background geology.
** Little success? ORLY?

* [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Buckland William Buckland]] (1784 - 1856) is said to have been able to tell during wanderings where exactly he was, just by checking the soil. Not that surprising if you consider that the man was one of the most important geologists (and paleontologists) of his time.

* [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Buckland William Buckland]] (1784 – 1856) is said to have been able to tell where exactly in or around London he was just by checking the soil. Not that surprising if you consider that the man was one of the most important geologists (and paleontologists) of his time.

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* Used a couple of times in ''[=~Jojo's Bizarre Adventure~=]'' part 3. First, the actual adventure is kicked off when Star Platinum spots an insect native to Egypt in Joseph's psychic photo of Dio. Once in the country, the group acquires a photo of Dio's mansion and asks around to find its location, attracting the attention of one of Dio's henchmen who later admits to their destination being in lower Cairo.
** In the manga, the photo is also given to a (professional) beggar who does manage to find the mansion on his own. [[spoiler:He's picked off by another of Dio's subordinates before the information can be relayed.]]

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* In a real-life case profiled on some TrueCrime show years ago, a killer backed his vehicle into a tree while fleeing the scene. Some seed pods were found in the bed of the suspect's truck. The police managed to DNA match the bean pods to that specific tree. This is an example of how this type of evidence is usually used, to confirm or reinforce a connection that is already known.
** Most likely the program was ''[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Detectives The New Detectives: Case Studies in Forensic Science]]''. The show mentions forensic applications of botany and entomology in different episodes. E.g., chiggers were the clincher in one case, being found in only one place in an entire county - the exact place a murderer chose to dump the body of his victim.
* According to TheOtherWiki, during WorldWarTwo sand used in the ballast of Japanese fire balloons was used to determine not only that they were not launched from within the United States, but also which Japanese beaches the sand was taken from.
* Intelligence agents have attempted (with little success currently) to locate Osama bin Laden by analysing the background in his videos. They actually succeeded during the Afgan war. However, the Geologist consulted didn't keep his mouth shut, and from then on any tapes smuggled out (and there is a dispute whether Osama is even alive and/or producing them) carefully conceal any background geology.
* The kidnapping/murder committed by [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leopold_and_Loeb Leopold and Loeb]] was linked to the perpetrators largely due to a pair of eyeglasses with an unusual hinge design found near the body, of which only '''three''' were sold in the area.
** Even worse for them, the other two owners were very easy to rule out as suspects: one was able to show his glasses to the police, and the other was out of town when the murder happened. Talk about bad luck.
* One bit of an episode of the docu-series ''Extreme Forensics'' had investigators trying to bust a guy's alibi that he was in the Midwest with family while he was allegedly murdering his wife in California. Desperate, because the rental car he had been driving had been washed of much evidence, they turned to trying to identify bug bits that had been caught in the radiator and found a grasshopper leg that was unique to a species in the Siera-Nevada region. It didn't break the case but it did show he was lying about where he was.

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<<|ForensicPhlebotinum|>>

* More TruthInTelevision: One bit of an episode of the (some DiscoveryChannel network) docu-series ''Extreme Forensics'' this troper caught had investigators trying to bust a guy's alibi that he was in the Midwest with family while he was allegedly murdering his wife in California. Desperate, because the rental car he had been driving had been washed of much evidence, they turned to trying to identify bug bits that had been caught in the radiator (Hi Grissom!) and found a grasshopper leg that was unique to a species in the Siera-Nevada region. It didn't break the case but it did show he was lying about where he was.

--->'''[[DarkwingDuck Negaduck]]'''

* In Disney's ''{{Mulan}}'', the Hun leader's eagle brings him a doll from a village to which they are en route. The doll has a white horse hair on it that tells him the Imperial Army (and their white horses) are there.

* Don't forget the time Abby tracks Reynosa's movements by tracking bug bites on her dead smuggler's skin... In a matter of hours...

* Don't forget the time Abby tracks Reynosa's path by tracking bug bites in her dead smuggler's food... In a matter of hours...

* In Disney's ''{{Mulan}}'', the Hun leader's eagle brings him a doll from a village to which they are en route. The doll has GPS evidence on it that tells him the imperial troops are there.

* Parodied in the NakedGun series where the scientist involved gives a long explanation of failed attempts at this, only to reveal that the information was obtained from an extremely obvious clue.

* Parodied in [[http://shortpacked.com/comic/book-6/03-gritty-and-adult/rareflower/ this]] ''Shortpacked!'' strip. One has to wonder why villains don't do this more often.