In 1893, an Austrian jurist and magistrate named Hans Gross (1847–1915) published Criminal Investigation: A Practical Handbook for Magistrates, Police Officers and Lawyers. One of the founding fathers of criminal profiling, Gross, together with French criminologist Edmond Locard (1877–1966), was a pioneer in crime scene investigation (CSI). Gross set out three essential principles for CSI:
a) The hermetic isolation of the crime scene.b) Its ‘systematic excavation for material evidence’.c) The establishment of a system for ensuring that all evidence was carefully logged, retained and kept intact on its journeythrough the criminal justice system.
Gross was adamant that one person – the investigating officer (IO) – should be in charge of any crime scene and take responsibility for it. He had to be an observant and persistent person. ‘He will examine little pieces of paper that have been thrown away,’ wrote Gross. ‘Everything will afford an opportunity for drawing conclusions and explaining what must have previously taken place.’ He warned against holding preconceptions and taking things at face value, which he considered were rooted in human instinct and culture. We tend to see what we expect to see, and a good IO had to acknowledge and transcend this trait to see beyond the obvious. One of Gross’s innovations was the use of the microscope, which allowed investigators to examine particles of dust invisible to the naked eye. Locard built on Gross’s initial observation that dust retained all manner of information that could help identify criminals and explain exactly what had happened at the scene of the crime. Locard also took inspiration from the greatest fictional detective of the late 19th century, Arthur Conan Doyle’s (1859–1930) Sherlock Holmes. The exploits of the Baker Street private detective captivated late Victorian readers and did much to establish a positive image of
Above. crime scene photographs from alphonse bertillon’s album of paris crime scenes (1901–08). having developed the use of photography to capture ‘mug shots’ of career criminals, bertillon later used forensic photography to preserve the crime scene
and thus aid detection.
18891892189218921893189418941895
Pauline Tarnowsky, the first female criminologist, publishes an anthro-pometric study of female criminals. Juan Vucetich establishes the first method of recording individualsfingerprints on file. In Argentina fingerprints are
’ used to convict Francisca Rojas of murdering her sons. Francis Galt
on outlines a statistical model of fingerprint analysis.
F
ounding father of criminal profiling Hans Gross formalizes the science of criminolo. Alphonse Bertillon testifies on
the authorship of a document during the Dreyfus Affair. Jean Pierre Mégnin
publishes his rwork on insects in cadav
evolutionary er Ink analysis identifies forged
s. documents in the trial of James Reavis.
C.
B.
A.
INTRODUCTION.
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detection in the minds of the British public, who previously had perceived plain-clothed police as spies.
Locard’s work was taken up and developed by French criminologist Dr Jean Alexandre Eugène Lacassagne (1843–1924), head of the Department of Legal Medicine at the University of Lyon, and a close friend of the Parisian forensic specialist. Lacassagne devised a system for matching a bullet found at a crime scene to the gun that fired it, and was able to calculate the length of time a body had been putrefying, enabling detectives to determine time of death more accurately. In 1886, he founded the journal Archives danthropologie criminelle, which showcased innovations in criminal investigation from around the world. By dissecting the bodies of victims of murder
and those supposed to have died of ‘natural causes’, Lacassagne was able to solve a number of murder cases and eventually to enable the conviction of French serial killer Joseph Vacher (1869–98).
Since the 1820s, it had been clear that fingerprints provided a unique reference point of identification. Sir William Herschel (1833–1917), while working as a civil servant in India, started putting fingerprints on contracts in the 1850s to prevent fraud. In the 1870s, while working in a hospital in Japan, Dr Henry Faulds (1843–1930) became convinced that each person’s fingerprints were unique and succeeded in exonerating an assumed criminal on the basis that his fingerprints differed from those discovered at the scene of the crime. He contacted Charles Darwin to ask him to help him work on his ideas but Darwin declined, passing his ideas on to Francis Galton (1822–1911). In 1880, Faulds published a paper on fingerprint identification in the magazine Nature, and in 1886 offered his ideas to the police in London, who promptly dismissed them. The Met were using Bertillon’s system and did not see the need to introduce fingerprinting. In 1888, Galton submitted a Royal Institution paper on fingerprint patterns without crediting Faulds, and in 1892 his book
18951895189518961896189718991901
Eduard Piotrowski publishes an important paper on blood spatter analysis.
Child psychologist Wilhelm Preyer proposes that handwriting is actually ‘brainwriting’.
Wilhelm His Sr produces the first ever facial reconstruction.
Handwriting expert Thomas H. Gurrin testifies at the trial
of Adolf Beck.
Police use microscopic analysis of wrapping paper to locate child murderer Amelia Dyer. A Fingerprint Bureau is
established in Kolkata, India.
The first organized police dog programme is introduced in Ghent, Belgium.
Karl Landsteiner discovers the ABO system of human blood types.
F.
E.
D.
SENSATIONALIZED MURDER & THE RISE OF THE DETECTIVE.
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‘One can only see what one observes, and one observes only things which are already in the mind.’ alphonse bertillon.
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Above. crime scene photograph by alphonse bertillon of an unknown
murder victim in paris, france.
INTRODUCTION.
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‘Justice withers, prison
