FBI’s chief explosives scientist to share insight into explosives investigations at URI
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During his presentation, “Explosive Investigations,” Yeager
will discuss a career that has taken him to crime scenes on Boylston Street and
beyond. His lecture is scheduled for URI’s Beaupre Center for Chemical and
Forensic Sciences (Room 100), 140 Flagg Road, on the Kingston Campus, from 3:30
to 5 p.m.
Before arriving at the FBI in 2000, Yeager worked as a research scientist and associate director of research and development at the Energetic Materials Research and Testing Center in New Mexico. For 10 years, he served as a physical scientist/forensic examiner for the FBI Laboratory’s Explosives Unit where he deployed as a bomb crime scene investigator to dozens of countries.
Yeager has three decades of experience with explosives and IEDs, has presented more than 250 talks at international meetings and conferences, and has produced more than 80 specialty publications on the topic.
Over the course of his career, Yeager has taught at multiple universities, consulted for the TV show Mythbusters, been profiled in Popular Mechanics, and even has his own personal IMDb page. In addition to analyzing the Marathon bombing,
Yeager has analyzed a number of
other high-profile cases, including the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, 1995
Oklahoma City bombing, 2016 Brussels bombing, and 2002 Bali nightclub bombings.
Yeager is a regular speaker in URI’s forensic lecture
series. This fall’s series includes speakers from Walter Reed National Military
Medical Center and the State Fire Marshal Office on topics ranging from crime
scene processing to a torched restaurant’s fire investigation.
Yeager’s lecture will be followed Oct. 25 by Daniel
Greenfield speaking on forensic psychiatry.
URI faculty members Bridget Buxton, an
underwater archaeologist, and Otto Gregory, a chemical
engineering professor who has consulted for the Department of Homeland
Security, will also present on forensic archaeology (Nov. 8) and forensic
corrosion cases (Nov. 22) this semester.
The long-running lecture series takes place in the
University’s Beaupre Center on Friday afternoons. The series is coordinated by
Professor of Chemistry Jimmie Oxley, an expert on explosives and energetic
materials, and Dennis Hilliard, director of the Rhode Island State Crime
Laboratory at URI. Those who can’t attend the seminars in-person can access them live online,
or at a later date.
(Schedule subject to change; join email list for updates.)
To learn more about the URI Forensic Seminar Series or be
added to the series’ email list, email dhilliard@uri.edu.
