Silent Witnesses: The Often Gruesome but Always Fascinating History of Forensic Science

Crime novelist and former police officer Nigel McCrery provides an account of all the major areas of forensic science from around the world over the past two centuries. The book weaves dramatic narrative and scientific principles together in a way that allows readers to figure out crimes along with the experts. Readers are introduced to such fascinating figures as Dr. Edmond Locard, the “French Sherlock Holmes”; Edward Heinrich, “Wizard of Berkeley,” who is credited with having solved more than 2,000 crimes; and Alphonse Bertillon, the French scientist whose guiding principle, “no two individuals share the same characteristics,” became the core of criminal identification. Landmark crime investigations examined in depth include a notorious murder involving blood evidence and defended by F. Lee Bailey, the seminal 1936 murder that demonstrated the usefulness of the microscope in examining trace evidence, the 1849 murder of a wealthy Boston businessman that demonstrated how difficult it is to successfully dispose of a corpse, and many others.

• Forensics: What Bugs, Burns, Prints, DNA, and More Tell Us About Crime
• Working Stiff: Two Years, 262 Bodies, and the Making of a Medical Examiner
• The Forensic Casebook: The Science of Crime Scene Investigation
• Dead Men Do Tell Tales: The Strange and Fascinating Cases of a Forensic Anthropologist
• Death's Acre: Inside the Legendary Forensic Lab the Body Farm Where the Dead Do Tell Tales
• Beyond the Body Farm: A Legendary Bone Detective Explores Murders, Mysteries, and the Revolution in Forensic Science
• Forensics: What Bugs, Burns, Prints, DNA and More Tell Us About Crime
• Dr. Mutter's Marvels: A True Tale of Intrigue and Innovation at the Dawn of Modern Medicine
• Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers
• Forensic Science: Crime Scene Analysis