The engrossing account of how science-based forensics transformed the
investigation of twentieth-century murders and in the process invented
CSI.
Crime scene investigation--or CSI--has captured the modern imagination.
On television screens and in newspapers, we follow the exploits of
forensic officers wearing protective suits and working behind police
tape to identify and secure physical evidence for laboratory analysis.
But where did this ensemble of investigative specialists and scientific
techniques come from?
In Murder and the Making of English CSI, Ian Burney and Neil Pemberton
tell the engrossing history of how, in the first half of the twentieth
century, novel routines, regulations, and techniques--from
chain-of-custody procedures to the analysis of hair, blood, and
fiber--fundamentally transformed the processing of murder scenes.
Focusing on two iconic English investigations--the 1924 case of Emily
Kaye, who was beaten and dismembered by her lover at a lonely beachfront
holiday cottage, and the 1953 investigation into John Christie's serial
murders in his dingy terraced home in London's West End--Burney and
Pemberton chart the emergence of the crime scene as a new space of
forensic activity.
Drawing on fascinating source material ranging from how-to investigator
handbooks and detective novels to crime journalism, police case reports,
and courtroom transcripts, the book shows readers how, over time, the
focus of murder inquiries shifted from a primarily medical and
autopsy-based interest in the victim's body to one dominated by
laboratory technicians laboring over minute trace evidence. Murder and
the Making of English CSI reveals the compelling and untold story of
how one of the most iconic features of our present-day forensic
landscape came into being. It is a must-read for forensic scientists,
historians, and true crime devotees alike.
