How Clothing Becomes Forensic Evidence in Criminal Trials: What Someone Was Wearing and Why It Matters to Prosecutors and Defense

Introduction

Clothing as physical evidence.

Suppose that someone spills juice on their shirt. Sometimes a slight stain remains even after washing it many times. Clothes are like that; they cling to what they touch. That’s why clothes matter so much when police are on the job after a crime.

In an adverse incident such as a robbery or attack, the people involved are typically wearing clothes. Those clothes come into contact with the ground, rub against walls, rub against other people, and are sometimes torn, stained, and dirty. Here lies the clue, which is all of this. Investigators refer to these clues as “evidence”, and clothing is one of the best sources of evidence.

How may clothing be relevant in criminal investigations?

Consider clothing as an “Unspoken Witness. It can’t talk, but it can tell a story: where someone was, what happened to them and sometimes even who he was with. A ripped sleeve may indicate some fighting. The stain could be blood. A loose thread that has snagged on a button could be from a different jacket.

Clothing is in close proximity to the perpetrator’s body and tends to hold many clues that no other evidence found at a crime scene can. That is why police, forensic scientists, lawyers and judges are very interested in what someone was wearing during or after a crime.

Clothing as Forensic Evidence

What constitutes clothing evidence?

Not all of the clothes found around a crime scene qualify as evidence. The clothing must be related to the crime; for instance, the clothing could be stained, torn, or even the clothing worn by a witness when he/she saw the perpetrator.

When clothing becomes evidence, it is:

Discovered in or in the vicinity of a crime scene, worn by a victim or suspect during the time of the crime, or bringing evidence, stains or marks that link it to the incident. When this clothing is identified, it is carefully collected, packaged and taken to a lab where scientists examine it carefully and learn more from it.

Types of clothing commonly examined: –

Any and all clothing worn by a person can be a piece of evidence, such as:

Shirts, t-shirts, blouses, Pants, jeans, skirts, Jackets, sweaters, Shoes, socks, Gloves, caps, Undergarments, Accessories such as belts, scarves and ties

All of these may be able to contain various types of clues depending on the part of the body it touched as well as the object it may have interacted with in the crime.

Clothing Evidence: Evidence types that can be found on clothing.

Blood, other body fluids

One of the most prevalent items to be discovered in clothing while investigating a violent crime is blood. In addition to blood, clothing can also be contaminated with saliva, sweat, or body fluids. Later, these fluids might be examined to determine which body they came from.

Hair and fibers

When people or objects touch, hair can easily transfer from one surface to another and become embedded in the other. Hair strands and small bits of fabric can easily be transferred from one surface to another when people or objects touch. A suspect’s jacket can contact a victim’s sweater, and fibers from the victim’s sweater are either embedded in the suspect’s or the other way around, sometimes so small that they can’t be seen without a microscope.

DNA

All people have DNA, which is a type of “fingerprint” in skin cells, hair roots, sweat and other body fluids. Scientists can identify a single person’s DNA in microscopic pieces of clothing that have been long after the person has put them away.

Materials present in soil, dust and other trace elements

Shoes and the bottoms of trousers can pick up soil, dust or sand on the ground as they are walked on. This can assist investigators in determining the location of the person, such as comparing soil from a suspect’s shoe to soil found at only one crime scene.

Gunshot residue

Upon firing a gun, small particles of gunpowder spray out and may get caught on the shooter’s clothing, particularly the cuffs and sleeves. The presence of this residue may provide clues to whether a person was near a gun when it was discharged.

Particles of paint, glass and other materials

Tiny paint chips or pieces of broken glass can get lodged in fabric in the event of a vehicle collision, break-in or damaged property. These particles may sometimes be matched to a particular car or to a broken window.

Biological and chemical stains

In addition to being stained with blood, clothing may also contain traces of chemicals, drugs, or other materials that may be part of a crime, such as a poison, an accelerant in a fire or a corrosive substance used in an assault.

The interpretation of Clothing Evidence.

How the evidence is interpreted by forensic experts

The first step to finding a stain or a fibre is merely the beginning. It’s going to be up to the forensic experts to figure out just what that finding means. For instance, if someone’s blood was found on another person’s shirt, it does not necessarily mean that the other person committed a crime, as it may have occurred in a number of ways, including to help an injured person.

Importance of context

Evidence from clothes is almost always used in conjunction with other evidence, such as witness statements, crime scene photographs, medical reports and so on. A stain or fiber alone rarely tells the entire story, and must be interpreted in conjunction with all the facts known about the case.

The evidence of clothing limitations

Clothing evidence cannot be perfect. There are a couple of important restrictions:

Fibers or DNA also can be transferred between persons without a crime being committed, for example, by sharing laundry or by normal daily contact.

Stains and damage may sometimes have multiple causes, and thus various parties have contradictory opinions.

Clothing, if not collected, stored, and handled properly, can be contaminated and render the results unreliable.

Clothing evidence in court 

How evidence is presented

The real garment (or photographs of it) is typically presented to a judge and jury in court. This allows them to see what investigators discovered and not just be told about it in words.

Expert testimony

Frequently, forensic scientists are brought in as expert witnesses in court. They describe in simple terms the tests that were performed on the clothes, what the outcomes were, and what this means.

Evidentiary value

Clothing evidence can be very convincing, as it will be something the judge and jury can see, and not like some other evidence – a more abstract fact. In a courtroom, a blood-stained shirt or ripped jacket can make a big impression.

Reliability and limitations

Courts, meanwhile, are wary of the significance of clothing evidence. Clothing evidence is sometimes dependent on the interpretation of that evidence, and that interpretation may sometimes vary between experts; therefore, judges and juries are reminded that clothing evidence is not the sole evidence in the case, but is to be viewed with all other evidence before them.

Case Examples

A missing button: In a famous case in Kolkata in March 1990, a young girl named Hetal Parekh was murdered inside her own house. The security guard of the building where she lived became the prime suspect. Police discovered a cream-coloured shirt button with a broken chain in the room where her body was found at the crime scene. A few days later, they did a search of the man’s home and discovered that there was a missing shirt that had just that kind of button. Along with other evidence in the case, the husband and the courts saw this small recovery as a big piece of evidence putting the accused on the scene. The Calcutta High Court and the Supreme Court of India took this as a crucial link in the chain of evidence and convicted the accused of murder. Dhananjoy Chatterjee vs State of West Bengal, Supreme Court of India)

What investigators/examiners concluded: In this case, it’s a single shirt button that becomes one of the most crucial pieces of evidence in a serious crime. What is often small and insignificant alone can be significant when combined with other components. However, when the shirt is discovered at a crime scene, and a similar shirt with the corresponding button is discovered with the accused, it is strong physical evidence linking a person to a location. The courts treated this recovery with great caution, considering it in conjunction with other evidence in the case, and not independently on its own, as clothing evidence should be used in a fair investigation.

Conclusion

Clothing plays an important role in the scene investigation of a crime. Clothing is a significant factor in the scene investigation of a crime.

When it comes to solving a crime, clothing can be one of the most important pieces of evidence available to forensic science. One stain, thread or rip can tie a person to a location, a fight, another person, even years after a crime is committed.

It is important to handle and interpret the data properly.

The care taken with clothing evidence is as good as the clothing itself. If it is improperly gathered, stored, or analysed, it can mislead investigators and a court to the wrong answer. That is why forensic scientists carefully follow these step-by-step procedures, and that is why the courts do not rely solely on the clothing evidence but use it in conjunction with all the other evidence in the case. A simple piece of clothing can tell the truth when handled properly. If it is not handled carefully, it can easily cover it.

References:

1. Wesolowski, K. & Kaszubinski, S. (2025). “Tracing the Threads: Comparing Red Garments in Forensic Investigations.” Applied Sciences, 15(14), 7945. Open access  https://doi.org/10.3390/app15147945
2. Williams, G. A. (2019). “Forensic textile damage analysis: recent advances.” Research and Reports in Forensic Medical Science, 8. Open access  https://doi.org/10.2147/RRFMS.S166435
3. National Institute of Justice (U.S. Department of Justice). “Maintaining a Chain of Custody” and “Study Assesses the Accuracy and Reproducibility of Bloodstain Pattern Analysis.” Open access  https://nij.ojp.gov/nij-hosted-online-training-courses/law-101-legal-guide-forensic-expert/sources-scientific-evidence/testing-or-evaluating-evidence-and-writing-reports/maintaining-chain-custody and https://nij.ojp.gov/topics/articles/study-assesses-accuracy-and-reproducibility-bloodstain-pattern-analysis
4. Divya, K. S. et al. “Chain of Custody.” StatPearls (NCBI Bookshelf, U.S. National Library of Medicine). Open access  https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK551677/
5. Interpol Review of Fibres and Textiles 2019–2022. Forensic Science International: Synergy. Open access  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.fsisyn.2022.100213

Case study section (Indian Kanoon)

1. Dhananjoy Chatterjee vs. State of West Bengal, Supreme Court of India, 11 January 1994  https://indiankanoon.org/doc/1351933/