NJIT student Mia LoRe photographing a shoe and impression. Credit: NJIT
Forensic science students at New Jersey institute of Technology are giving criminal investigators a step up on solving cases, and they're doing it by enlisting the campus community's help through an enticing offer — “lend your soles” for free pizza.
The university’s Forensic Science Student Association (FSSA) is hosting pop-up events on campus to collect shoe impressions from willing volunteers in an effort to expand NJIT's Shoeprint Image Capture and Retrieval (SICAR) database — one of only two forensic footwear databases in New Jersey.
The database uses advanced imaging and machine learning algorithms to match recovered shoe prints from crime scenes with specific shoe models and brands, encompassing far more than your classic loafers, Doc Martens, Chuck Taylors or Air Jordans, according to FSSA President Pranav Prabhu.
With thousands of shoe makes and models registered since its launch last year, the database requires constant updates to help law enforcement keep pace with the flurry of fresh shoe styles (and new shoe print patterns) released each year.
“Footwear impressions are often overlooked but are a valuable source of evidence that can narrow investigations, generate new leads and potentially establish a direct link between a suspect and a crime scene,” said Prabhu ’26, a forensic science major from Edison, NJ who got involved in NJIT’s SICAR project last spring. “By keeping our database active and expanding it with new entries, we’re hoping to give investigators a continuously growing resource that assists them in solving cases more efficiently. The more diverse the entries, the more effective the database becomes.”
The project began in 2022, when NJIT’s Forensic Professor of Practice Kevin Parmelee learned that the nationally used SICAR footwear database was no longer being updated.
Seeing an opportunity to aid criminal investigations in N.J. and beyond, Parmelee connected with a collaborative group of footwear examiners from around the U.S. and Canada — known as the Footwear Reference Collaboration Group (FRCG) —and proposed that NJIT forensic students help collect and document new footwear examples for establishing and expanding the university’s own database.
The collaboration was a perfect fit.
“A benefit of organizing this group at NJIT is it can provide local law enforcement agencies with a footwear database that they may use as an investigative tool. Only the New Jersey State Police and NJIT have such a database in the state currently,” said Parmelee, a former Somerset County (N.J.) detective. “However, any agency can send the NJIT Footwear Collaboration Group a digital image of a footwear impression and we can run it through our database.
“If it is in our system, we can offer the agency the make and model shoe descriptions, and they can then use that information when searching for potential suspects.”
NJIT's forensic students have been crucial to the operation — photographing shoes, creating exemplar impressions and preparing digital files for footwear examiners to encode.
During September’s National Forensic Science Week, the organization held its first shoe print collection event of the fall.
“We invite students to 'lend us their soles' in exchange for pizza,” said Prabhu. “While they enjoy their slice, we’ll coat the shoe sole with liquid silicon and press it onto paper over a foam pad to create a detailed impression. The print is then enhanced with magnetic powder to highlight patterns, which are photographed and submitted to our SICAR contact for coding and inclusion in the database.”
According to Parmelee, the student-collected files are expected to be shared with labs across North America by 2025, enhancing the database's usefulness in investigations. The project is not the first time NJIT's forensic program has involved its students in real-world forensic work.
“There are four of us on this project. … It's such a unique hands-on opportunity that gives us practical skills directly applicable to forensic work," said Prabhu.
For now, Prabhu says to check the FSSA's website for details on their upcoming collection events in the Campus Center, where you can score a free slice of pizza.
"We’re encouraging the NJIT community to lend their shoes for impressions during our next collection events. Hopefully, we can continue to raise awareness about the importance of forensic science and inspire more people to contribute, ensuring the SICAR database continues to expand."
Republished courtesy of NJIT