# Forensic Spoorology: Seeing and Understanding Human Behavior through Observation, Classification and Interpretation of Spoor Evidence

> Can a trail of footprints show not just who walked by, but whether they were calm, lost or afraid? A U.S. Marshals master tracker sets out a step-by-step method for reading human behaviour from tracks, tests it with five volunteers in a riding arena, and argues for tracking’s place as a forensic science in court.

Summary by Kersey Lawrence, Original Wisdom. Updated 9 November 2026. Page: https://www.originalwisdom.com/tracking-literature/2011-cunningham-forensic-spoorology-seeing-understanding/

## Citation and access

- **Authors:** Tyron J. Cunningham
- **Year published:** 2011
- **Journal or source:** Master of Military Art and Science thesis, U.S. Army Command and General Staff College
- **Full citation:** Cunningham, T. J. 2011. Forensic spoorology: seeing and understanding human behavior through observation, classification and interpretation of spoor evidence. Master of Military Art and Science thesis, U.S. Army Command and General Staff College, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. 208 pp.
- **Access status:** Hosted: U.S. government work, not subject to copyright in the United States
- **PDF:** https://www.originalwisdom.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/11/2011_Cunningham_forensic-spoorology.pdf

## Tags

- **Species:** Humans
- **Region:** North America > United States
- **Tracking:** Gaits; Individual identification; Snow tracks; Track measurements; Tracking; Tracks; Tracks and signs identification; Trailing
- **Behaviour and ecology:** Behaviour; Movement
- **Methods and technology:** Direct observation; Literature review
- **Data type:** Modelling or theoretical; New field data; Protocol or guidelines; Review
- **Observer qualification:** Certified trackers
- **Discipline:** Human tracking
- **Year published:** 2011

## Detailed keywords

- **Species:** Studied: humans (five adult trackmakers, labelled Z1 to Z5: four men and one woman, Z4). The thesis also discusses tracking of animals, for example by hunters and by wildlife officers following poachers, but no animals were studied.
- **Location and habitat:** Outdoor horse-riding arena at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, United States: flat, with no vegetation, soft fine soil over a hardened layer of packed clay. Case studies from Lake Anna, Louisa County, Virginia (woodland and lakeshore) and the Tazlina store near mile 111 of the Richardson Highway, Alaska (packed ice, snow over pavement and deep snow, at night).
- **Topics:** forensic tracking (“spoorology”); human tracking for law enforcement, military and search and rescue; reading human behaviour (locomotor and psychomotor) from footprints and trails; the Behavior, Gait, Spoor (BGS) paradigm based on Newton’s laws of motion and linearity; the Observation, Classification and Interpretation of Spoor Evidence (OCISE) algorithm; spoor platting, gait platting and behaviour platting; foot measurement, quadrant reference, foot mapping, ground contact points, stride and step, pitch angle and trail width analysis; baseline establishment; register deviation anomalies; “eight adaptive traits”; mental states such as panic, fear, hurrying and calm; crime scene evidence and footwear impressions; court admissibility of tracking evidence (Frye, Federal Rule of Evidence 702, Daubert, Kumho Tire, Henry v. Ryan); shoeprint case law; tracker certification standards; tracking vocabulary. Inconsistencies in the thesis: in the Spoor Analysis Lane design the trackmakers are called “H1 through H5”, but Z1 to Z5 everywhere else; the text says Z4 was an adult female, and Table 13 marks Z4 as female in the spoor analysis lane column but male in the incident reconstruction area column; Table 13 marks crawling or rolling as “No” for all trackmakers, while the text reports kneeling, bracing on all fours and lying on the ground.
- **Statistics or models:** No statistical tests. Results are recorded as yes or no marks and measurements in a Uniform Scale Format Synch Matrix (Tables 4 to 16). Conceptual models: the BGS paradigm and the OCISE algorithm. The author states the experiments were too small for a quantitative view of statistical accuracy.
- **Data type:** New field data: two tracking experiments by the author with five trackmakers (dates not given; the thesis covers August 2010 to June 2011; 45 degrees Fahrenheit, dry, windy). Two case studies supplied by other trackers (Virginia, a January; Alaska, 30 January 1998). Literature and case law review. Recommended certification standards and vocabulary in the appendices.

## Synopsis

### 1. What they did

The author, a supervisory criminal investigator with the U.S. Marshals Service, has been tracking for four decades. He set up and commanded two Marshals tracking units, in Alaska (1998 to 2002) and Wyoming (2003 to 2006), and was certified by them as a Certified Master Scout Tracker in 2004. In this master’s thesis he sets out to lay a foundation for tracking as a forensic science, which he calls “spoorology”, that courts could rely on.

His questions were:

- Can tracks and signs, observed, classified and interpreted in a systematic way, meet the accuracy courts require?

- Can this method include or exclude suspects?

- Can human behaviour be recognised in a trail of footprints?

He reviewed writing on human behaviour, gait (the way people walk), tracking and footwear evidence, and court cases on shoeprint and tracking evidence. He then built a framework from Newton’s laws of motion, the Behavior, Gait, Spoor (BGS) paradigm, and a step-by-step method for reading a trail, the Observation, Classification and Interpretation of Spoor Evidence (OCISE) algorithm. OCISE has three stages: describing the prints themselves (spoor platting), the walking pattern (gait platting) and what the trail says about the person’s state of mind (behaviour platting).

He tested OCISE in two experiments in a flat riding arena at Fort Leavenworth, with five adult trackmakers, each in different shoes:

- Spoor Analysis Lanes. Each trackmaker walked down their own 25 m lane while he watched, to record a “baseline” of how each person walks normally.

- Incident Reconstruction Area. Out of his sight, in a 25 by 75 m area, the trackmakers acted out three situations, alone or in groups: walking home after hearing of a death in the family; being lost and disoriented at dusk while hiking; and checking whether police were watching a family marijuana plot. He then read their trails to identify each person and their behaviour.

He also included two real cases written by other trackers: a Virginia game warden and an Alaska State Trooper.

### 2. What they found

Identifying the trackmakers

- All prints were the clearest class of print and showed full detail. Each trackmaker’s shoes had a different tread, which separated them.

- Foot lengths ranged from 11.5 to 13.5 inches. Every trackmaker had a different overall track length, and nearly all other measurements also differed (the exceptions were sole length for Z2 and Z3 and heel length for Z3 and Z4).

- From the measurements he estimated each person’s height and weight range.

- Every trail in the incident area was matched to its trackmaker’s baseline from the lanes.

Reading behaviour

- In the lanes, all five were read as walking, turning, stopping, and sitting or standing; none were running, slipping or crawling.

- In the incident area, all five were recorded as showing thinking or planning, panic or fear, hurrying and being out of control at some point, as well as quiet and calm moments. None were recorded as nervous or aggressive. In one situation, when several trackmakers moved over the same ground, the trails briefly had to be sorted out.

The case studies

- Virginia: a game warden followed the trails of people who ran from him for about 300 yards. Stride length and a sudden change of direction showed they had run, and a cleared spot behind a tree showed where one had hidden to watch. He identified that person by shoe prints. Five people were found, and the track evidence was used in court.

- Alaska: a trooper followed two sets of tracks at night in snow by flashlight. Strides over 40 inches showed running; shortening strides showed slowing to a jog; the tracks showed where both stopped and looked back, where they split up, and where one lay down in the snow behind a box.

Certification

He found no universal tracker standard in the United States: tracking companies and agencies each had their own. He proposes one in an appendix: a written test (70% to pass) and field problems, with six levels from Certified Apprentice Tracker I to Certified Master Tracker.

### 3. What they concluded

- The author concludes that human behaviour can be identified in footfall patterns and trails, and that the tracks hold all the walking and state-of-mind information, if experienced trackers observe, classify and interpret them.

- He states that the experiments were too small to give statistical accuracies, but give useful qualitative indications.

- Reading a trail first-hand is stronger than interpreting someone else’s recorded data, especially for reading behaviour.

- The greatest challenge is the skill level of the tracker. Tracking needs more research, education and training before it is accepted as a forensic science.

- He recommends that investigators and crime scene staff be trained to be “track aware”, so tracks are not destroyed before a tracker can read them.

- Further research: harder ground, vegetation and slopes; longer trails; tracker eye fatigue; error rates; whether tracking first at a crime scene leads to more evidence; telling apart the tracks of victims, suspects and witnesses; and universal tracker certification.

### 4. How tracking was or was not used

Tracking is the subject and the method. The author read and measured footprints and trails, and used what he calls the deliberate trailing method, finding every step, to identify trackmakers and interpret their behaviour. The case studies describe trailing people who had fled, reading stride length, changes of direction, stops, hiding places and shoe tread, in woodland and in snow at night.

### 5. Tracker or observer certification

The author, who did the tracking in the experiments, reports that he was awarded Certified Master Scout Tracker in 2004 through the certification process of the U.S. Marshals Service for the Districts of Alaska and Wyoming, an internal standard. The two case-study trackers (a Virginia game warden and an Alaska State Trooper tracker) are not described further. The thesis does not report a test of how accurately the behaviour readings matched what the trackmakers actually did.

### 6. Other technologies, skills or innovations

- A new vocabulary and set of acronyms for forensic tracking, and a recommended tracker vocabulary (Appendix E).

- A Uniform Scale Format Synch Matrix for recording every part of a trail (Appendix B).

- A Foot Impression Reference Matrix to estimate height and weight from shoe size and print.

- A tracker crime scene kit for field experiments (Appendix C).

- Recommended tracker certification standards (Appendix D).

### 8. Implications for tracking (Original Wisdom's observations)

_These are Original Wisdom's observations, not the authors'._

- The thesis is a practitioner’s attempt to set out, step by step, how a human tracker moves from seeing a print to reading the state of mind of the person who made it, and why courts might accept that reading.

- The experiments used one tracker, five trackmakers and flat, bare soil, and the author notes they were too small for statistical accuracy. Repeating them with several trackers working blind, and comparing their readings with what the trackmakers actually did, would show how consistent and accurate behaviour reading is.

## Cite this summary

Lawrence, K. 2026. Summary of: Forensic Spoorology: Seeing and Understanding Human Behavior through Observation, Classification and Interpretation of Spoor Evidence (Cunningham, 2011). Original Wisdom, Tracking Literature. https://www.originalwisdom.com/tracking-literature/2011-cunningham-forensic-spoorology-seeing-understanding/