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Chemical testing utilized
James Marsh, an English chemist, uses chemical processes to determine arsenic as the cause of death in a murder trial. -
Finger prints found to be unique
Henry Faulds and William James Herschel publish a paper describing the uniqueness of fingerprints. Francis Galton, a scientist, adapted their findings for the court. -
Criminal features reduced to numerical measurements.
Anthropometry is a system using various measurements of physical features like bones. It was used throughout the US and Europe. -
Finger print ID used in crimes
An Argentinean police officer, is the first to use fingerprints as evidence in a murder investigation. -
Investigations into blood markers
Human blood grouping, ABO, discovered by Karl Landsteiner and adapted for use on bloodstains by Dieter Max Richter. -
Guns are unique
Victor Balthazard realizes that tools used to make gun barrels never leave the same markings, and individual gun barrels leave identifying grooves on each bullet fired through it. He developed several methods of matching bullets to guns via photography. -
Crime lab built
First police crime lab established in Los Angeles. -
Lie detector
Prototype polygraph, which was invented by John Larson in 1921, developed for use in police stations. -
Voice recording, used as evidence
A sound spectrograph discovered to be able to record voices. Voiceprints began to be used in investigations and as court evidence. -
First national crime system
FBI established the National Crime Information Center, a computerized national filing system on wanted people, stolen vehicles, weapons. -
Advances in residue detection
Technology developed at Aerospace Corporation in the US to detect gunshot residue, which can link a suspect to a crime scene, and can show how close that suspect was to the gun. -
Advances in DNA lead to conviction
DNA fingerprinting led to conviction of Colin Pitchfork in the murder of two teenage girls. This evidence cleared the main suspect in the case, who likely would have been convicted without it. -
DNA catches the criminal
Tommy Lee Andrews convicted of a series of sexual assaults, using DNA profiling. -
Dental match
apanese researchers develop a dental x-ray matching system. This system can automatically match dental x-rays in a database, and makes a positive match in less than 4 seconds. -
Facial sketches matched to photos
Michigan state university develops software that automatically matches hand-drawn facial sketches to mug shots stored in databases. -
Hair now used in forensics
Victor Balthazard and Marcelle Lambert publish first study on hair, including microscopic studies from most animals. First legal case ever involving hair also took place following this study.
