Pioneers in Forensic Science

Innovations and Issues in Practice

Kelly M. Pyrek

• Publisher: CRC Press
• Year: 2017
• ISBN:
  9781351655866
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Law
• Subtopic: Criminal Law
• Index: Law

This book highlights the contributions of leading forensic science practitioners, iconic figures who have been integral in both establishing current scientific and medicolegal practices and innovative evidence collection, testing, and analysis methods. Such professionals include Henry Lee, Michael Baden, William Bass, Jay Siegel, John Butler, Cyril Wecht, Vincent Di Maio, Marcella Fierro, Barry Fisher, and more. Previously unpublished interviews with these pioneers in the field, expressly undertaken for the purposes this book, examine the last 30 years—past trends that have shaped the field—as well as current and emerging trends that have, and will shape, the future of forensic science.

1The Forensic Science Experts: Pioneers, Masters, and Students

To understand modern forensic science, it is necessary to appreciate the origins of the field and understand that it is borne of some of the best (the quest for the truth) and the worst (crime, politics, adversarial adjudication) of humanity—and that it exists somewhere between an applied science and a technical science. Its birthright to pure science is denied by critics, while its proponents recognize that it shares the challenges inherent to any evolving enterprise. Its practitioners labor within this fractious environment, providing an essential service to the justice system while fending off criticisms of their intentions and their methodologies.

Forensic science operates within a realm of inherited processes from the masters and evolving techniques developed by its present-day practitioners, and this existence amidst old and new thinking may be contributing to some of the challenges that will be explored in this book. As Bell (2008, page 4) observes, “Forensic science is historical in practice as well as in philosophy. Many modern laboratory protocols recreate history with each rendition.” Bell (2008, page 4) adds, “History and precedent lie at the heart of science, just as they do at the heart of the law. Forensic science lives where the two overlap.” It is up to us to “understand where forensic science came from and how it evolved,” in order to be “much better equipped to evaluate and apply it in the future” (Bell, 2008, page xiii).

It is not within the scope of this work to trace the history of forensic science when others have already done so quite admirably, such as Suzanne Bell, PhD, author of Crime and Circumstance: Investigating the History of Forensic Science. Bell, a forensic chemist at West Virginia University, reminds us that there was no initial nexus of information known as forensic science; the lineages of chemistry, biology, and pathology, she says, were separate from one another until early practitioners “borrowed and integrated existing science, technology and techniques” into the growing critical mass of information that could be construed collectively as forensic science (Bell, 2008, page 191). She calls forensic scientists the “archeologists of the recent past” because “We recover artifacts from a place, carefully recording their context. That place is usually a crime scene that imprisons the echoes of a moment frozen in time. The information recorded in that moment begins to decay the second it is created. We use our expertise to evaluate and interpret crime scene artifacts to recreate the likeliest scenario to explain what we found, where we found it, and in what condition. By doing so, we help sort out conflicting versions of what happened and why” (Bell, 2008, page xi).

Spitz (2006) says that the earliest association between law and medicine dates back to the Egyptian culture around 3000 BC, while more obvious medicolegal associations can be found in codes of law ranging from 1700 to 1400 BC. Ancient Greece had the work of Hippocrates, who studied medical and ethical issues and presented these opinions in court, while the ancient Roman civilizations employed amicus curiae (friends of the court) to provide expert testimony. Spitz (2006) observes, “Developments involving medico-legal investigations continued throughout the middle ages with greater reliance on medical testimony in cases of physical injury, infanticide, rape and bestiality.” Medicolegal autopsies were performed as early as 1300 on victims of homicides and suicides and those individuals executed for their crimes. Spitz (2006) reports, “One of the first documents pertaining to post-mortem examinations was a Chinese handbook titled His Yuan Lu. It contained simple autopsy techniques, proposed general post-mortem guidelines, and discussed injuries caused by blunt and sharp instruments. It also offered comments on the determination of whether an individual in water had drowned or died prior to submersion and whether a burned victim was alive or dead at the onset of the fire.”

Fast-forward several hundred years. The sixteenth century ushered in scholarly writings that further developed the concept of forensic science. Paulo Zacchias (1584–1659) came to be called the father of legal medicine for his comprehensive work on the characteristics of wounds and questionable deaths. By the mid-seventeenth century, formal lectures in forensic medicine were being held in Western Europe; as Spitz (2006) explains, “During this period, Germany had the most advanced court system in Europe and it was routine for physicians to render opinions in criminal proceedings regarding injuries and cause of death. Judicial authorities all over Europe were now using forensically knowledgeable physicians in criminal and civil trials. At this time, physicians had a limited role in regard to crime scene investigation which was typically carried out by the police; however, in complicated cases police investigators occasionally consulted a physician to discuss crime scene evidence.”

The concept of medicolegal institutes through which medicolegal principles could be practiced began to spread throughout much of Europe in the 18th and 19th centuries. Spitz (2006) observes, “Continued research in forensic medicine and toxicology laid the foundation for the future of forensic pathology in Europe and the United States.” The rise of the ancient coroner system in England in the twelfth century set the stage for the modern coroner and medical examiner office, and further set the wheels in motion for a more sophisticated approach to medicolegal death investigation and the practice of forensic science and criminalistics.

As Saferstein (2001) observes, “Forensic science owes its origins first to those individuals who developed the principles and techniques needed to identify or compare physical evidence, and second to those who recognized the necessity of merging these principles into a coherent discipline that could be practically applied to a criminal justice system.” A number of individuals made significant contributions to the body of knowledge that was shaping up to be the field of forensic science. Mathieu Orfila (1787–1853) published one of the first treatises on the detection of poisons, and many consider him to be the one who established forensic toxicology as a scientific endeavor, according to Saferstein (2001). Alphonse Bertillon (1853–1914) created the study of anthropometry, a system of taking body measurements to distinguish one individual from another. Saferstein (2001) notes, “For nearly two decades, this system was considered the most accurate method of personal identification. Although anthropometry was eventually replaced by fingerprinting in the early 1900s, Bertillon’s early efforts have earned him the distinction of being known as the father of criminal identification.”

Fisher and Fisher (2007) say that despite this measurement called Bertillonage, real strides in fingerprinting came at the hands of Francis Galton, Henry Faulds, and Edward Henry in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Edward Henry, head of Scotland Yard in the early 1900s, devised a system that became known as the Henry Classification System. It was eventually replaced by the computerized database known as the Automated Fingerprint Identification System (AFIS). Francis Galton (1822–1911) was the first to undertake a comprehensive study of fingerprints and established an early classification of prints to be used as proof of personal identification.

From a forensic serology point of view, a milestone was reached in 1901 when Karl Landsteiner discovered that human blood can be typed; however, in 1915, Leone Lattes (1887–1954) created a procedure for determining the classification of blood from a dried bloodstain, with important implications for the field of criminalistics. Alexander Wiener discovered the Rhesus factor in 1940 for various other blood subgroups. Albert Osborn in 1910 recognized the value of individualization of handwriting and other techniques, which eventually led to the discipline of questioned documents and evolved to include more modern techniques using paper, ink, and printing equipment.

In 1953, James Watson and Francis Crick used x-ray crystallography techniques developed by Rosalind Franklin to find the structure and function of deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA). There was limited use of DNA in the 1970s and 1980s, but its value was recognized. One of the first true DNA tests was created in the 1980s by Sir Alec Jeffreys, known as genetic fingerprinting, where DNA was digested with enzymes that caused it to break down into specific fragments that are unique to each person—these fragments were separated based on their size using electrophoresis, to create this “fingerprint” of the DNA in the electrophoresis gel image. This technique was used most famously in the Colin Pitchfork case to find the murderer of two young girls in England in 1983. Around the same time, scientist Kerry Mullis realized that DNA could be copied millions of times by mimicking natural processes occurring inside living cells—this came to be known as the polymerase chain reaction (PCR). It could be done in a lab to produce high levels of testable DNA from exceedingly small biological samples, and the tests could be run in such a way that accuracy was assured, lending further reliability and credence to the method.

Today’s generation of forensic scientists owe a debt of gratitude to the individuals preceding them who pioneered the methods and mastered the critical thinking skills necessary in a profession so critical that it can convict the guilty and exonerate the innocent.

As we have seen, the nineteenth century helped forge the precursors to modern forensic science techniques, and its practitioners paved the way for the advances that were to come from successors. Building upon each decade that came before it, forensic scientists have crafted their field from the rigors of chemistry, biology, and medicine. This book recognizes that the work of a handful of notable individuals is constructed upon the study and discipline of countless men and women who helped advance the science to what it is today. As Bell (2008, page 191) reminds us, “The forensic profession crystallized around strong personalities such as Orfila, Spilsbury, Norris, McCrone, Bertillon, Galton, Kind, Helpern and others. Many stumbled into the spotlight; others chased it. Where crime, blood and murder are the subjects, there is no lack of audience.” These individuals left a legacy that continues today, and as we will see in Chapter 6, the decades have not diminished the demand for their work as much as their fascinating personas. As Bell (2008, page 191) observes, “Many of today’s forensic scientists can trace their professional lineage to one or more of these men, and many of them have become famous in their own right.”

As Hebrard and Daoust (2013, page 274) explain, “During the second half of the 19th century, under the influence of a group of forensic pathologists and scientists, a new set of ideas and common views about forensic science and the law were introduced. Young industrial societies were not satisfied with confession anymore; sciences had to break into the investigation process and the criminal trial in order to reinforce the judicial system. These pioneers spread forensic sciences thanks to a criminological approach and the issue of crime repetition (recidivism).”

Let’s take a brief look at a few more individuals whose contributions helped shape modern forensic science. Austrian Hans Gross, who practiced a unique comparative analytical science through the late 1800s and into the turn of the century, is considered by some to be the more historic father of criminalistics, recognized for his worldview that practitioners from various disciplines could help form expert opinion and contribute to the analysis of physical evidence for the purpose of solving crimes. Gross wrote what is considered to be the first forensic science textbook, called Criminal Investigation, and launched a professional journal titled Kriminologie.

One of Gross’s contemporaries was Frenchman Edmond Locard, an expert in medicine as well as in law who created the first forensic laboratory in 1910. The tenet known as Locard’s exchange principle was named for him and is an offshoot of his studies and writings. Every contact leaves a trace, Locard taught, and an exchange of materials between individuals and locations can help inform the investigational process. Locard (1930, pages 279–298) once noted that “the microscopic debris that covers our clothes and bodies are the mute witnesses, sure and faithful, of all our movements and all our encounters.” He also observed, “It is impossible for a criminal to act, especially considering the intensity of a crime, without leaving traces of this presence” (Houck, 2001, page xix).

Even as criminalistics was finding its own way, physicians working in clinical forensic medicine had been serving the justice system in the United Kingdom for at least a century, according to Payne-James (2016, pages 539–567), who observes, “What is remarkable is that the nature of the cases [of the late 1800s and early 1900s] is not far removed from those seen today.” Bell (2008) alludes to a distinct dichotomy of the evolution of forensic science in the United States, with forensic pathology making strides in the East while criminalistics gains advances in the West.

The advent of modern policing did provide an opportunity for forensic science methods from the masters to gain recognition for their ability to help advance criminal investigations. August Vollmer, chief of police around the turn of the century in Berkeley, California, recruited faculty members from the University of California at Berkeley (UC Berkeley) to assist with casework, using the knowledge of academic experts in biology and chemistry in a newly founded school of criminology that addressed police procedures and physical evidence. In 1937, Vollmer’s program became a part of UC Berkeley’s academic programs, and a young upstart by the name of Paul L. Kirk, PhD, assumed the position of advisor to the criminology program. Vollmer and Kirk emphasized the importance of standardization and the adaptation of new technology for criminal investigation and evidence processing in a laboratory setting in 1916, and this was directed by Albert Schneider. While Locard is credited with establishing the first forensic laboratory, experts everywhere were beginning to create facilities that were building upon the earliest precepts from Locard.

Hebrard and Daoust (2013, page 3) note, “Since the 1990s, confession is no longer the greatest kind of criminal evidence. Forensic sciences have become the scientific benchmark that legal systems cannot do without and that stands next to, if not ahead of, other kinds of criminal evidence in priority. At the end of the 20th and beginning of the 21st centuries, information technologies joined the area of forensic sciences. Criminalistics already included fingerprints, ballistics, toxicology, arson and explosives investigations, documents and handwriting analyses, microanalysis, traffic accidentology, anthropology, entomology, and so on. The field continued to expand as new forensic fields of identification, such as DNA technology, new tools that managed evidence, such as Automated Fingerprint Identification System (AFIS), and new means of c...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• Preface
• Acknowledgments
• About the Author
• Chapter 1 The Forensic Science Experts: Pioneers, Masters, and Students
• Chapter 2 Flaws and Fraud: The Accusations against Forensic Science
• Chapter 3 Quality Improvement in Forensic Laboratories
• Chapter 4 Quality Improvement in Forensic Medicine Facilities
• Chapter 5 Celebrity and the Forensic Scientist
• Chapter 6 The Future of Forensic Science
• Index