Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1905-09-16
SCIENCE AND CRIME
New Weapons Against Muir
derers and Forgers.
FELLOWS LOT Is HARD
MIcRo-PHoToaRAPH NOW IDEN-
TITLES HAIR AND BLOOD STAINS.
Several Queer Stories Of Detective In
genuity in Running Down Grim
inals Here and Abroad.
FELLOWS LOT IS HARD

Copyright 1905 by John Elfretb watkins)
The most interesting and exciting war Of
| wits now waging in this strenuous world of
| ours is that between science and crime
OF all the artillery, light and heavy,
which the legions of science have directed
against the cohorts of crime, none is more
merciless in effect than the camera which
produces the Interchangeable To Illus
trate the powers of this Misunderstanding
| engine of war, one must realize that If
photographed by such an instrument-large
enough to perpetuate you upon one of its
colossal plates-you would appear fully as
| tall as Deudhunga, the highest peak of
the Himalayas. So you will not express
surprise that drop of blood, a single hair,
a particle of skin found under the finger
nail of person suspected of crime may
now tell the tale of his guilt or innocence.
1t will establish from what class of animal
the blood is from; whether the hair is
| from q beast, man woman, and whether
| 1t matches the hair of certain person; and
| this science is so far developing that even
the minutest particle of skin will demon
| strate its own origin.
One Hair Gave Clew.
Some time ago at Bedford, Ind, Miss
! Schafer. school teacher. was found mys-
I
| fingers were found hairs torn from her foe,
whether beast, negro or white man was
not known. Louisville expert who made
! the photOmcrographi test pronounced at
once that the hair was from n white man.
| This method, developed by DR.. Paul jesse
rich, the judicial chemist of Leipzig, was
| hrst demonstrated in a case wherein the
| life of a suspected murderer literally hung
| upon hair. The case was one of murder
and two men We're suspected of the crime.
| A single hair was found upon the clothing
| of the victim, and this was enlarged into a
| photomicrograph. Hairs from one of the
! suspected men were also taken and pho
| tomicrographed. Then the two pictures
| We're compared. but the difference in struct-
| ure, tint and general appearance was mark
| ed. Hairs from the other man were then
treated, and these, too, were found to be
| unlike that taken from the murdered wo-
| mans clothing. The latter to be
| pointed showing that it probably had never
been cut. Working upon this clew and max
| ing comparisons with the hirsute coverings
! of all sorts of persons and animals it was
| finally discovered that the hair IN question
| was that of an old yellow smooth-haired
! dog. 1t then came out that one of the pris-
| oners owned just such dog, a fresh hair
| from which cOnfOrmed in every detail with
| that found upon the victim. On this evil
| dence the owner of the dog was held, and
| he subsequently confessed that he alone
| committed the crime.
| Now, it appears that no two hairs are eX-
| actly alike when taken from different spe-
| cies. races or sexes. Animal hair differs
| in construction from that grown on a human
| head. In human hair the surface stratum
| is smooth and thin. The circular section
| is comparatively broad forming the main
| part of the hair shaft. 1t Is striped in APP
| pearance and carries the coloring matter
| The tubular part is thin, extending to not
| more than one-quarter of the entire width
| of the hair. In the animal hair the tube
| fills nearly the entire width. The hair from
! boards is the thickest of the human cate
hlin = m n a
| eter, while the hair from a woman's head
| is found fine 0.06 nm. The ends of hair
| are also closely studied. and If ragged and
| torn at the extremities the presumption is
| that locks are from woman, or possibly
| a man wearing his hair long and untrim-
med. Much is told by the roots. Those
| from womans head are thin and atten-
| uated those from mans scalp club-shap-
| ed while the hair itself from his beard has
| cells containing air, and so on down the
| ladder of evolution are found characters
| tics too technical to mention. Hair being
| but prolongation of the cuticle, 1t Is, OF
| course, not unreasonable to believe that
| minute particles of skin may be traced by
| the photomicrograph.
How Blood Tells.
But it is blood that tells. the old saw
says. Now when there Is made a photo
micrograph of the vital fluid there is seen
series of uniform. scattered objects-the
corpuscles, enlarged Those of man are
circular. a characteristic shared by all
other mammals except the camel In the
lower vertebrates they are oval, elliptical
and on. So, then, If a spot of blood
found on a suspected murderer IS that of
a bird reptile, for example, the photo
micrograph will free him, but If it be mann
| mails blood, other than that Of camel
what then? Photomicrographsts now
claim that they distinguish mans blood
from that of such other mammals; that the
corpuscles while agreeing in shape differ
in diameters and that diameters are easily
compared with this powerful instrument.
They say that this diameter for a is
1920 of inch of a dog. 1850; of a
mouse, 1850; of a sheep 1000 and
But surer blood test Independent of the
photomicrograph and one claimed to d1stln-
guish between man and beast has even
more lately been developed. / have seen
this--this Bordet Inexperienced by Prof.
John Lear in his biological laboratory at
Muhlenberg College. Its first appearance
as a factor in medico-legal proceedings oc-
Cured during the recent investigation of
the massacres of the Jews at Kishlner,
Russia, when 1t was applied to the clothing
of child to determine whether some
blood spots were of human or animal origin.
This Bordet test has for its basis the af-
fnity which blood is discovered to have
for It's like. Human blood has this affinity
only for human blood; dogs blood for dogs
blood, and on. suspicious spot upon
clothing, wood or metal being brought to
Prof. Lear, he first makes microscopic
test to determine whether it is blood of
any kind Then 1t is : simple matter to
prove whether 1t is animals blood other
than cancels.
Inject Mans Blood Into Rabbit
The next step is to thrust the needle
point of a hypodermic syringe into the
arm of a healthy man and to suck out
| Herewith five cubic sentimeters of blood.
A rabbit with shaven spot over his alb
| domen is next produced from the laboratory
menagerie and this healthy human blood is
| injected into its circulation After this
| there form in the rabbits blood certain
products which have the characteristics of
| attracting only human blood. The rabbit
| is finally bled. it's blood being collected in
a. vessel and cooled, during which process
| its corpuscles settle in a clot, on the top of
which rises light liquid (the serum) con-
| tanning these products which attract human
| blood only and repel that of any other ami
| NAL.
| The professor meanwhile has had before
| him. awaiting the final test. those blood
| stains suspected of being of human origin.
! In one recent case they were found upon
| an alleged murderer who claimed that they
| had oozed from his pet dog. The suspicious
| toip in sol M