Physical Damage to Textiles

ANY MATERIAL COMPOSED OF FIBRES IS A TEXTILE, AND THIS DEFINITION covers an extremely wide range of products in everyday use. Worldwide, over 35 million tonnes of textile fibre is consumed annually, ending up not only as clothing, upholstery, bed linen and carpets, but also in such items as ropes, seat belts, nets, road stabilisation mats, drainage pipes and tents. It is not surprising that, when a crime takes place, the ubiquitous textile is nearly always present and is very often directly involved. The successful use of textiles in such a broad range of applications is due in part to the great variety of fibres and fabric constructions that are available. Most textile items are compound structures composed of up to four levels—fibre, yarn, fabric and the final article—and within each level, there are many choices available. There are more than fifty types of textile fibre in commercial use of various lengths and diameters; for example, cotton, wool, flax, jute, nylon, polyester, acrylic and polypropylene. Normally, these fibres are formed into yarns of various types (for example, monofilament or multifilament; ring, rotor or air-jet spun; single, plied or cabled), and then the yarns are interlaced into fabrics, either by weaving, knitting, braiding or even knotting (in the case of nets). In addition to the great many woven and knitted constructions, so-called 'non-woven' fabrics may also be formed directly from fibres, without the intermediate yarn form. Furthermore, while paper and leather are usually not considered as textiles, they are nonetheless fibrous structures, and the same damage analysis techniques can be applied to them. It is this very variety which often makes textiles such an important element in forensic investigations (such as in matching of evidence), yet it also makes it difficult to devise a 'recipe book' approach to the interpretation