Maggots, Murder, and Men

The secondary title of Maggots, Murder, and Men by Zakaria Erzinçlioglu is accurate-- Memories and Reflections of a Forensic Entomologist. Dr. Zak, as he is known to those unwilling to pronounce his name, has compiled an anthology of anecdotes and opinions accumulated over his long career of examining bugs for the British criminal justice system. I chose to read this book because I wanted to learn more than I already knew about forensic entomology, but I did not want to shell out the bucks to purchase an appropriate textbook. Maggots, Murder, and Men is a fine introduction to the basics; Dr. Erzinçlioglu explains quite nicely the logic of using flies, fly larvae and other creepy-crawlies to determine the time of death of a body. He provides a bit of the fly life cycle and discusses the ecology of various species, but the entomology ends there. There are no identification keys or the like.The book is well written and entertaining. Besides bug stories, there is also a fair bit of exposition on such subjects as the criminal justice system, hypothesis testing, shady people (from both sides of the law), and Sherlock Holmes. I am quite sure that while one is picking through many tedious piles of insect samples a jillion odd thoughts pop to mind. I am thankful that Zakaria Erzinçlioglu chose to commit some of his to posterity.

"Maggots, Murder, and Men"...is a 256 page treatise written by a notable forensic entomologist with more than 25 years of experience with Cambridge University academia, research at Durham University, and administration of criminal law in England. The book is scholarly and extraordinarily well-written with innumerous factual details on a variety of maggots, begetter flies and a medley of insects which, to the trained scientist, can provided desirous and often crucial information and evidence that otherwise may be lacking regarding the time of day, season and place(s) of death. Such information is often critical in indicting and convicting or dismissing suspects in deaths from natural, accidental, suicidal, unknown, or homocidal causes. More than a potpourri of intensely interesting forensic cases solved or confirmed by forensic entomology, the author provides 10 chapters which move from discussion of entomology, maggots, flies, to the identification of human remains and the nature of crime, criminals and the justice system. Chapter 4 "Foul, Strange and Unnatural" describes some grisly cases and the author muses about those evils perpetrated today contrasted to those in times long gone and proffers that "meaningless violence now occurs during times of peace and prosperity," and that the modern day vandal "derives pleasure from distress it causes others." He is loathe to openly discuss the feral things he has seen done to children. He is aghast at those who give "serious talk about the 'rights' of paedophiles to indulge their desires" and who assert these paedophiles "are yet another persecuted minority." He is concerned about societal fragmentation by the agency of moral relativism. Dr. Erzinclioglu regards some values/actions as "sacrosanct and inviolable." Reference is given to the initial application of DNA using PCR in Chapter 7 and of the "coffin" scuttle fly Conicera tibialis which can locate a corpse 6 feet underground, and he provides comnmentaries in Chapter 8 "Past Times" of the four plagues of Egypt (O.T.), and coverage of myiasis (obligate and/or facultative parasitic maggot feeding on live flesh) with specific references to King Antiochus IV Epiphanes (Syria), Herod the Great, King Herod Agrippa (Judea), Pheretima, etc., and reviews some of the unique problems of myiasis in domesticated versus indigenous mammals of different continents. The Medicinal application of maggot therapy is well-covered in Chapter 9 that is replete with major tropical maladies, parasitology, and of the scientists who made discoveries leading to effective treatments and observations of maggot infestation in the Napoleonic, American Civil and the Great Wars. In the final 25 pages, Chapter 10, the author articulates those perceived flaws and weaknesses he detected within the forensics of the Criminal Justice System (CJS), an adversarial system betwixt barristers. Elements of corruption on occasion were observed within the police system regarding creditabil

This is an account of the author's personal experiences, philosophy, views and concerns about the field of forensic science. Being an entomologist, the author preferentially discusses the use of insect activity and development on a corpse in estimating, among other things, the time of death. Relevant cases are discussed. But there's more. The author also discusses a variety of other aspects of importance in the world of forensic science that may be overlooked in other books on the subject. For example, less than honest stategies used by some barristers and sollicitors, some police officers and some forensic scientits in order to ensure that a certain case is resolved in a manner that they feel it should be resolved, rather than by basing it on hard evidence (the specific problems discussed in this regard are those in Britain). A great variety of personal anecdotes - some gruesome, some funny - complete this delightful book. It will not disappoint forensic science buffs.

With its arresting title and anecdotal style, this British entomologist's memoir of his forensic career will appeal to crime buffs and bug enthusiasts alike. A big Sherlock Holmes fan, Erzinclioglu shows how the life span and habits of blowflies, cheese skippers, scuttle flies and numerous other opportunistic insects help reconstruct events surrounding a suspicious death.Like Holmes, the entomologist can examine a scene of chaos and decomposition and baffle the onlooker with his pronouncements. For the untrained witness, even the expert police detective, will not have noted the presence of one type of maggot and the absence of another, or the evidence of several generations activity or the accumulation of tiny pupae cases among the debris. "When one looks at a complex scene, with vast numbers of small objects in it, the human mind will notice only those things with which it is familiar. The rest will make no sense and will be ignored."Of course Erzinclioglu is not in the habit of making dramatic statements at the scene. He describes the painstaking gathering and labeling of specimens, the further examination of the body on the pathologist's table and the subsequent sorting and analysis of samples, which leads, most often, to a reasonably precise determination of time of death. As the pathologist cannot pinpoint time of death after about three days, this determination is the most important aspect of the entomologist's job.Obviously this is not always easy - animal predation, weather, locality and other factors may complicate the scientist's work, and Erzinclioglu describes a few mistakes - his own as well as others, as he takes the reader through 25 years of criminal investigation. Mostly, however, his results concur with other evidence or provide essential leads, though not all cases are solved.His anecdotal style takes us through case after case - the discovery of decomposed or even skeletal remains and the subsequent investigation of insect activity. Sometimes the body has been moved after death; occasionally insect evidence on a suspect may link him to the crime. Most often murder is not the intriguing mystery of fiction but the sordid story of the handyman bashing the old lady for her money, the husband disposing of the wife, the violent thief. But a few deaths are particularly haunting - the young suicide found four years afterwards in a filthy, rat-infested house used as storage for cloth bags, the air and floor filled with moths. The horrible image of the old man shown to have died of natural causes a week after the house he was lying in was boarded up.Not every case concerns murder (or even death) and not every case belongs to Erzinclioglu. He describes the discovery of a skull in Tennessee in which a nest of paper wasps determined time of death. In New Zealand investigators pinpointed the origin of marijuana shipments from the types of insect remains found in the cannabis. He devotes a chapter to revisiting historical events in the light