Fingerprints: The Origins of Crime Detection and the Murder Case That Launched Forensic Science (Paperback)

In the Middle Ages, disputes were often solved by having the disputants dip their bodies into scalding hot water or be branded with red-hot iron. After the sores festered for a few days, a whiff of the odor from the infection in the injury would suggest whose side was favored by God. In other cases, disputants beat each other with sticks. These trials by ordeal were gradually replaced by witnesses for the prosecution. The only problem there was that liars could cause lots of deaths and did. Gradually, the defense got to use witnesses as well. Who was right? Following that, physical evidence began to be used in cases. Professional detective work began in France in the 19th century (led by Vidocq who was the model for Jean Valjean and his police nemesis in Les Miserables), and England soon followed after some embarrassing scandals of police ineptitude.

Several people became interested in physical characteristics of people at the same time. In India, dislike of the British was leading Indian people to disavow their agreements. A British magistrate began having them affix partial sets of fingerprints. The method helped intimidate people to perform. Separately, a doctor who had practiced in Japan had noticed that fingerprints seemed to be unique and proposed that they be used to identify criminals (there was a concern that those who continued to break the law remain incarcerated). Separately, a Frenchman found a series of body measurements that could verify a person's identity without using fingerprints. This method gradually lost out to fingerprints, which proved to be easier to do and identify.

The stage was thus set for a fascinating case. A couple were murdered in their shop. A smeared thumbprint was found on the cash box that matched one of the suspects. The leading experts on fingerprints all offered themselves for the trial. When the defense upset the circumstantial evidence and cast doubt on the eyewitnesses, the prosecutor had no choice but to use the fingerprints. We will never know what weight the jury placed on this, but two hours later they convicted. Nineteen days later the two guilty parties were hung.

A number of other fascinating cases are briefly outlined where fingerprints either helped locate the criminal (some of whom then confessed) or freed an innocent person.

There's a lot of description about how the identification methods have evolved. Did you know that if someone physically erases their fingerprints, new ones will grow in that are the same?

Following that, you get the credit wars that raged among those who worked in the area. Here's where the book tailed off in interest for me.

Fingerprints have kept becoming more and more useful as new ways of capturing them have been developed. Also, criminals seem to be not very smart about keeping their fingerprints to themselves. I loved the part about the criminals who threw away the package their gloves came in with fingerprints all over the packaging.

To this day, no one can prove that all fingerprints are unique. But they have become a universally accepted form of proof. Do you have any idea about how this uniqueness could be proved? Perhaps the human genome project will provide a way to double check fingerprints against DNA to establish the point.

Keep searching for the best and most reliable evidence! That's the best guarantee of our freedom.