Knowledge Organization and its Contribution to the Optimization of the Criminal Trace Chain of Custody: A Case Study at the Scientific Police of Rio Grande do Norte (PCI/RN)
Knowledge Organization; Classification; Forensic traces; Chain of custody; Forensic science.
The Organization and Representation of Knowledge (ORC) is a fundamental field of Information Science, responsible for structuring and systematizing information in order to ensure its access and efficient use. In the context of forensic investigations, this need becomes even more evident due to the complexity, diversity, and legal relevance of forensic remains, whose proper management directly impacts the integrity of the chain of custody and the validity of forensic evidence. In the Scientific Police of Rio Grande do Norte (PCIRN), there is a lack of a standardized classification system capable of conceptually representing and organizing forensic traces, hindering their recovery, traceability and preservation. In view of this problem, this study has the following general objective: To analyze the applicability of the principles and elements of the Knowledge Organization in the design of a system of classification of forensic traces that meets the demands of management, traceability and integrity of forensic evidence in the PCIRN Custody Center. Methodologically, this is a case study, characterized as a bibliographic, exploratory-descriptive, qualitative-quantitative research with an inductive approach. For data collection, semi-structured interviews are used and, as analysis techniques, the application of Content Analysis (CA) and Domain Analysis (DA) is proposed to examine and structure the collected data.