Hard Evidence: How Detectives Inside the FBI's Sci-Crime Lab Have Helped Solve America's Toughest Cases

by David Fisher and David Fisher

Book Overview

Hard Evidencereveals, for the very first time in print, what goes on in the FBI's modern sci-crime lab--and it will dramatically alter your understanding of crime detection.??Here you will learn the... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0671793691
• ISBN13: 9780671793692
• Release Date: January 1995
• Publisher: Simon & Schuster
• Length: 316 Pages
• Weight: 2.50 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.0" x 6.3" x 9.4"

Customer Reviews

Way better than CSI

I love forensics! From the very first episode of CSI I was hooked on Sci-crime sleuths. I love the idea of "silent witnesses", things like DNA, paint chips, a strand of hair, being able to put even the cleverest of criminals behind bars. But "Hard Evidence" makes CSI look like a high school science project. Fisher's book deals with the real cases that have impacted our lives. Historical and contemporary. Perhaps the most interesting was how the FBI was able to find out not only how, but who was responsible for the destruction of the PanAm flight over Lockerbie Scotland from a single piece of plastic no larger than a thumbnail. Fisher's style is easy to read yet informative and detailed at the same time. He makes the lab and the people who work in it come alive. Although some of the material is dated by today's standards, it's still a fascinating read. I'd love to see him write an updated version.

Science and the evil that men do

"Hard Evidence" was published in 1995, after the first bombing of the World Trade Center but well before the second. It is fascinating to learn how the FBI and other law enforcement agents were able to catch the original bombers so quickly, through forensic evidence left at the bomb site. Many of the most interesting cases in this book involve bombs, including the explosion of Pan Am flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland that was eventually traced to the Libyans, the extortionist who was blowing up transmission towers in the Pacific Northwest, and the package bomb that killed federal judge Robert Vance. The FBI really shines in cases such as these, where sometimes thousands of pieces of potential evidence have to be analyzed, and hundreds of leads have to be followed--which makes me a bit uneasy about our current Administration's effort to turn FBI agents into something other than the world's best crime solvers.Sometimes there is very little evidence: a tiny chip of pink paint off of a girl's bicycle convicted one murderer; a partial egg casing from a body louse, another.Inside the FBI's sci-crime lab, the author divides his narrative between the Chemistry/Toxicology Unit, Explosives, Hairs and Fiber, Latent Fingerprint and DNA Analysis, Documents, Firearms and Toolmarks, and the Special Photography, Video Enhancement, and Polygraph Units. He uses obscure cases as well as famous ones to illuminate the techniques employed by each group of experts. FBI forensic scientists have to become experts in arcana that most of us wouldn't think about in a life-time.(Unless we plan to commit a federal crime. Then we'd better think hard about all of them. It worries me that the copy of "Hard Evidence" I read was heavily underlined, especially in the chapter on explosives).Some of the cases in "Hard Evidence" depended upon expertise in identifying the origin of a feather, showing the difference between wig and Barbie doll hair, and intimate knowledge of the process used to manufacture plastic garbage bags. I did find one minor misstatement in the author's discussion of body fluids left at crime scenes: forensic dentistry helped convict Theodore Bundy, but it was the bite-mark pattern left by the assailant, not the saliva left in the wound as stated in this book. The forensic dentist recognized that the murderer had a chip on his front tooth that made a unique pattern on his victim. He was then able to recreate the identical pattern using the model of Bundy's teeth.Even so, "Hard Evidence" is a good read. Those who are already knowledgeable about forensics and American crime will find never-before-published cases that illuminate even the most obscure connection between science and the evil that men do.

An Accurate Portrait of the FBI Laboratory

As one of the FBI Lab personnel interviewed by Mr. Fisher I can attest that his presentation of the material reported in his excellent book is accurate. I was impressed with his thoroughness during the time he spent in the Lab conducting his interviews and reviewing case facts. And, even though I was intimately familiar with much of the material contained in the book, I was still fascinated by Fisher's perspective and his ability to weave the material into a thrilling portrait of actual forensic scientists at work. An excellent read!

The book that changed my life

I'm probably being a little dramatic when I say this book changed my life, but in a way it did. I had absolutely no clue what I wanted to do with my life until I read this book. I am currently a junior inhigh school student, but after I read this book in the eighth grade I became absolutely fascinated with forensic science. I've read anything on the topic I can get my hands on since. This book provides an overview of all the divisions of the FBI's crime lab and how they all work. It goes through details of how the cases are solved. Another thing great is that parts of the book are told by the agents that worked the cases. This way you get a first had look at what happened instead of just a historical look.

Great for Quincy, Law & Order, NYPD Blues fans, only better

This book is well written and thoroughly engrossing. Not normally a non-fiction reader, I found I could not put Hard Evidence down. It is easy to understand, easy to read and filled with thorough explanations on cases I have heard of from the newspapers. Each chapter deals with a specific area of the lab so you can pick and choose your interests or read cover-to-cover as I did. Read about the lastest technologies and the people who put them to use to solve a variety of crimes. Highly recommended.