With all great writing, inspiration tends to be a vital component! To inspire your writing, begin by doing some online research to explore a variety of real-life criminal cases. There are no real parameters for the kinds of cases that you can explore and research, but you should keep in mind that your ultimate goal is to find a case that you can use as a basis for your own short story. While many serious criminal cases involving physical evidence tend to be a bit graphic, please do your best to choose a real-life story that is as appropriate for school and adapt accordingly when adding your own details.

Once you have selected a real-life criminal case, write a short summary of the case.

Next, it is time to write your own short story. Regardless of the factors involved in your real-life case, you will need to alter this case to not only make it your own creative endeavor, but also to include and meet the following requirements:

Minimum of two pages
Includes and highlights physical evidence in the form of blood, fingerprints, and hair or other DNA
Physical evidence needs to be a main focus in your story – for example, perhaps the physical evidence is what helps to solve the case and catch the culprit or perhaps the physical evidence is mishandled and deems the case unsolvable.

The goal of writing this short story is to show and explain the importance of physical evidence in a creative (yet also informative) manner. So, while you might use the pieces from the real-life crime to shape your own story, you will need to find a way to give physical evidence a significant role in the story. Avoid simply summarizing the real-life story – remember, you’ve already done that, and this should be a creative, fictional piece of writing. Finally, please include a list of all websites and resources that you used to help craft this story.