Irrefutable Evidence: Adventures in the History of Forensic Science
Crime novelist Kurland (The Empress of India) takes his cue from the rash of other surveys detailing crime-solving techniques after successful shows likeCSI,in an uninspired fashion. He covers the basic techniques of forensics, from fingerprinting and ballistics to blood spatter analysis and DNA. Each of the founding fathers gets his due: French ex-criminal-turned-detective Eugène François Vidocq, the inspiration for Poe's fictional Dupin and the first to index criminals; Alphonse Bertillon, another Frenchman and the inventor of anthropometrics (or Bertillonage), which identified criminals by physical measurements; and Edward Henry and Juan Vucetich, who, in the late 19th century, developed independently of each other the first reliable methods of classifying fingerprints. Each breakthrough is punctuated by cases illustrating its usefulness, such as computerized fingerprint databases, which led to the 1989 arrest of Night Stalker Richard Ramirez. Kurland shifts abruptly between detailed descriptions of techniques and oversimplifications like DNA is the stuff that people are made from, which will surely frustrate forensic fans eager for in-depth analysis. Illus.(Nov.)Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.