The Father of Forensics: The Groundbreaking Cases of Sir Bernard Spilsbury, and the Beginnings of Modern CSI
True-crime readers, historical division, are served a full plate of murder with this biography of a forensic pathologist who was once one of the most famous people in Britain. Bernard Spilsbury (1877-1947) achieved high standing with judges and juries through a precision in postmortem examinations previously absent from British police procedure. Killers who would have escaped punishment pre-Spilsbury began to drop through the hangman's trap door. Yet Spilsbury was not an automatic shill for the prosecution, according to author Evans. His expert testimony convinced juries to acquit, as well, and thus Spilsbury enjoyed a sterling reputation. Spilsbury's professional renown will be less interesting to Evans' audience than the collection of cases the author presents. Evans proves to be a verbally agile narrator of the macabre, figuratively shaking his head about toxic love triangles and murder-for-insurance schemes that produced dismembered bodies and charred corpses. Crediting Spilsbury for making medical evidence acceptable to British courts, Evans delivers a page-turner for fans of the hot genre of criminal forensics.Gilbert TaylorCopyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved