CRIME INVESTIGATION PHYSICAL EVIDENCE AND THE POLICE LABORATORY

Definitely a must have for anyone serious about learning forensic scientists. Paul Kirk's books are still used today due to the accuracy of his work. Very smart man indeed!

Little did I realize when I met Dr. Kirk as a new graduate student at UC Berkeley in 1970 that I was face to face with a legend. I was looking and interviewing for a PhD thesis advisor just having graduated from UC Berkeley's chemistry department with a BS and found in the short period I spent in his lab that his contributions to this extremely important discipline were already incalculable. I was given his first edition of "Crime Investigation" and a long reading list to pursue as a means of determining my exact interests for conducting new research in this environment. Many years later I found myself deeply involved in many other laboratory-related forensic science projects and casework and drew heavily on that early information I received through this book (I still have and have read the second edition). It is a useful and still important book and one that has been called by others "the Bible of Forensic Science". Though the field has advanced in so many ways since its writing, it should be in the library of every serious forensic science student and practitioner of criminalistics. If it is not, then you should consider yourself only standing on one professional leg. It is highly recommended.