History of Forensics

By 30003552
  • 1250

    First Forensics Case

    First Forensics Case
    In China; there was a stabbing in the town and all of the knives were gathered together. Flies were attracted to the knife with blood remains on it, and the perpetrator confessed.

  • Mathieu Orfila

    Mathieu Orfila
    "Father of Forensic Toxicology" - He tested the effects of poisons on animals and then published a book on his findings.

  • William Herschel

    William Herschel
    Used thumbprints to document his workers in India

  • Alphonse Bertillon

    Alphonse Bertillon
    "Father of Criminal Identification" - Created a system called Anthropometry and used it to distinguish individuals through body measurements.

  • Henry Faulds

    Henry Faulds
    First elimination of an innocent suspect. Used fingerprints to identify the innocent man as not guilty.

  • Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

    Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
    Wrote Sherlock Holmes novels and short stories. Considered the creator of crime themed entertainment. Said to have made crime-detection a popular subject.

  • Francis Galton

    Francis Galton
    Wrote a book called "Finger Prints" and proved fingerprints are unique.. Did the first definitive fingerprint study and created a classification system for them.

  • Hans Gross

    Hans Gross
    Described how to apply scientific principles in criminal investigating and published his works in a book: "Criminal Investigation".

  • Karl Landsteiner

    Karl Landsteiner
    Worked on blood and blood types. HE discovered ABO blood groups and eventually received a Nobel Prize for his work.

  • Edmond Locard

    Edmond Locard
    Applied principles created by Hans Gross to a crime lab. Later, he would be a director at the University of Lyons, (in France). Specifically, in the Institute for Criminalistics

  • Albert S. Osborn

    Albert S. Osborn
    Worked on developing principles of document examinations such as forgery. He also published "Questioned Documents".

  • Leone Lattes

    Leone Lattes
    Worked with blood. Specifically, he learned how to tell blood type from dried blood.

  • August Vollmer

    August Vollmer
    Created the First crime lab in the United States of America. This lab was located in Los Angeles, California.

  • Calvin Goddard

    Calvin Goddard
    Invented a kind of microscope used to compare two things side by side. It was called a "comparison microscope". Originally, this was used to compare bullets and see if they were fired from the same weapon.