Stories From Main Street: CSI Meets New Rochelle High School

NEW ROCHELLE, N.Y. (WCBS 880) -- A high school final like no other was held Wednesday at New Rochelle High School.

For this high school final, you need a corpse, a keen eye and a strong stomach, WCBS 880's Sean Adams reported.

"All the stuff you see on C.S.I. and all those things, we do that all for real," said Scott Rubins, who teaches forensic science at New Rochelle High School. "The whole purpose of the class is to teach the kids how to think and process."

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For their final, students processed one of six mock crimes scenes in the woods off Webster Avenue. The scenes include yellow police tape, dummies that stand in for the deceased and evidence in the brush.

"We clearly can't run DNA in the classroom, but we look at hair and fiber, we look at bullets and bullet casings, we do an arson lab," Rubins said.

Senior Daniella Aguilar tip-toed around a stabbing victim.

"We found trails of blood with a lot of droplets so it was probably a really low velocity and slow drip," she said.

Senior Jennifer Barajas investigated an alleged hunting accident. A man in a tree claimed he dropped his rifle, it discharged and killed his friend.

"We did notice that there was no dirt on the rifle and there was supposed to be dirt if it fell from the tree, so we're leaning towards a homicide," she said.

Thanks to donations, New Rochelle police are on hand to grade these junior crime scene investigators.

"People as young as high school children that you see here are really knowledgeable just from what they see in TV and it sparks their interest," said Sgt. Rob Torr. "So they're already ahead of the game the minute they're in the classroom."

"If you want to go kick in doors and pull people and catch bad guys, go do that," Rubins said. "But if you want to work in a lab, you really need your chemistry or bio-chem major and it's a lot of work."

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