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First pathology reports published.
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First recorded instance of physical matching of evidence leading to a murder conviction (John Toms, England). Evidence was a torn edge of newspaper in a pistol that matched newspaper in his pocket.
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German chemist Valentin Ross developed a method of detecting arsenic in a victim's stomach, thus advancing the investigation of poison deaths.
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Clothing and shoes of a farm laborer were examined and found to match evidence of a nearby murder scene, where a young woman was found drowned in a shallow pool.
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James Marsh, an English chemist, uses chemical processes to determine arsenic as the cause of death in a murder trial.
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San Francisco uses photography for criminal identification, the first city in the US to do so.
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Henry Faulds and William James Herschel publish a paper describing the uniqueness of fingerprints. Francis Galton, a scientist, adapted their findings for the court. Galton's system identified the following patterns: plain arch, tented arch, simple loop, central pocket loop, double loop, lateral pocket loop, plain whorl, and accidental.
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Human blood grouping, ABO, discovered by Karl Landsteiner and adapted for use on bloodstains by Dieter Max Richter.
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Galton-Henry system of fingerprint identification officially used by Scotland Yard, and is the most widely used fingerprinting method to date.
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NY state prison system implemented fingerprint identification.
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Technology speeds up DNA profiling time, from 6-8 weeks to between 1-2 days.
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Britain's Forensic Science Service develops online footwear coding and detection system. This helps police to identify footwear marks quickly.
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A way for scientists to visualize fingerprints even after the print has been removed is developed, relating to how fingerprints can corrode metal surfaces.