Instead, Otago SPCA senior inspector Stephanie Saunders will be turning her newfound detective skills to the fight against crimes involving animals.
"Animal CSI" is an emerging science in which investigators are adapting human crime scene investigation techniques for use in the animal world.
Blood splatter analysis, animal forensics, entomology and clandestine grave detection were just some of the areas covered during a three-day course in the United States which Ms Saunders attended last month.
Previously, a lack of evidence had prevented her being able to take cases of animal abuse further, but now she is confident her new skills will help her get more convictions.
"I'm going to be looking at things completely differently."
Her first reaction on hearing about animal CSI had been "how much of this am I actually going to use", but "a whole new world" had opened up, she said.
As animal CSI was such a new area, there had been few animal examples for them to learn from during the course and they had learned by studying pictures of human crime scenes instead, Ms Saunders said.
"It was hard, because I've now seen pictures of people killed in every imaginable way.
"Initially, I was on the back of my seat, but I have to say once we were given the tools you quickly became quite clinical."
Some of the tools she will be using here in New Zealand include a collection kit for the proper collection of samples such as blood swabs or soil samples, ultraviolet light, and using markers to take photographs of evidence.
"The bulk of offending we are dealing with now is more ignorance and negligence rather than out and out cruelty, but it [cruelty] is still happening and often it is hard to establish how it happened."
A section of the course dealt with sharp force, blunt force and gunshot wound trauma and she would be working a lot more closely with veterinarians to determine the place and cause of injury or death.
Where before she often had to accept people's word about how an animal had been injured or died, she now had the knowledge to make her own investigations to find the truth, she said.
"It is pretty exciting times and pretty neat to be involved with it."
Financial restrictions will inhibit the use of some techniques, such as the use of DNA analysis.
A DNA test which might cost $US75 in the US, could cost hundreds or even thousands in New Zealand, she said.
Ms Saunders was one of two New Zealand inspectors to take the course and will be using her new skills on the job in Otago, as well as travelling to other parts of the country when needed.
