Crime-busters turn to moss to help solve crimes

GREEN CLUES
  • Pieces of moss collected as evidence in the investigation of the 2011 murder of 4-year-old Katherine “Baby Kate” Phillips in Mason County. FIELD MUSEUM
    Pieces of moss collected as evidence in the investigation of the 2011 murder of 4-year-old Katherine “Baby Kate” Phillips in Mason County. FIELD MUSEUM

    LANSING

    Can tiny pieces of moss become crime-busters? Yes, according to a new study examining how law enforcement agencies, forensic teams and botanists have used moss to solve murders, track missing people, calculate how long ago someone died and – in a notorious western Michigan case, try to locate the body of a baby murdered by her father.

    Fragments and shoots of moss “are easily detached or brok…