33 Eerie 20th-Century Crime Scenes Photographed By Alphonse Bertillon
In 1903, Parisian police clerk Alphonse Bertillon became the first to photo document a crime scene. Years earlier, he streamlined the use of mugshots, effectively revolutionizing detective work all with a camera.
Monsieur Falla, murdered in his sleep, in the corridor of his apartment at 160 Rue du Temple in Paris, 1905.Public Domain When Alphonse Bertillon joined the Prefecture of Police in Paris in 1879, the department had already collected 80,000 photographs of known criminals. They were captured under variable lighting, and at most, only accompanied by a name and address.Metropolitan Museum of Art Bertillon, who was a mere entry-level clerk at the time, began to devise a more efficient manner of cataloguing criminal records. He would measure 11 unique traits of as many convicted criminals as possible, and note these next to their mugshots — one photo of their face head-on, and another from from the side.Metropolitan Museum of Art Among the traits Bertillon recorded was arm length, head length, and the distance between fingertips with arms outstretched.Metropolitan Museum of Art Known also as the anthropometric system, criminal records also kept track of a suspect's height, ear size, foot size, arm length, eye color, skin tone, and any notable marks.Metropolitan Museum of Art Within a few years, Bertillon's eponymous system allowed officers to scan their records by any category they desired — from foot size and hair color to birth marks and skin tone. It was a much more efficient system than the previous model, which forced police to rifle through stacks of photos with lacking details.Metropolitan Museum of Art Bertillon was also the first to take crime scene photos. He believed the evidence captured on film could serve officers during ongoing investigations. Taking photos also stopped officers from contaminating the scene.Metropolitan Museum of Art Many of Bertillon's peers scoffed at the notion that photography would, in any way, help reduce the crime rate.Metropolitan Museum of Art But by 1883, Bertillon had collected 7,336 measurements and identified 49 repeat offenders. That figure reached 241 by the following year.Metropolitan Museum of Art It was a much more efficient system than the previous model, which forced police to rifle through stacks of photos with lacking details.Metropolitan Museum of Art Metropolitan Museum of Art Often heralded as the first forensic expert for his innovations, Alphonse Bertillon was also one of the first known people to identify a criminal by a fingerprint collected at a crime scene. Metropolitan Museum of Art But his path to detective reform wasn't always clear. As a youth, Bertillon had failed out of school twice — to the chagrin of his statistician father and brother. Metropolitan Museum of Art Metropolitan Museum of Art After successfully enlisting in the French army at 26 years of age, Bertillon served one tour — as a bugle player.Metropolitan Museum of Art Metropolitan Museum of Art Bertillon's father eventually got him work at the Paris police department.Metropolitan Museum of Art But Alphonse Bertillon's innovative system was not without its flaws. While he was correct in positing that each human being is unique, and thus a roster of unique traits could more effectively identify a suspect, the Bertillon System failed when it came to documenting children.Metropolitan Museum of Art The measurements of underage criminals, such as head circumference or height, were constantly changing. It was thus incredibly difficult to document a child and then identify them later when their measurements had all matured and changed.Metropolitan Museum of Art This is the bedroom of Madame Debeinche, a Parisian woman who was murdered on May 5, 1903.Her chambers remain one of the earliest photographed crime scenes in history, and Debeinche herself one of the earliest murder victims ever photographed.
Metropolitan Museum of Art Metropolitan Museum of Art Sherlock Holmes author Sir Arthur Conan Doyle wrote in The Hound of Baskervilles that Holmes was "the second highest expert in Europe" — after Alphonse Bertillon.Metropolitan Museum of Art Bertillon preferred to take low-angle photographs like this one, as well as bird's-eye views of his victims.Metropolitan Museum of Art He also used compounds to preserve crime scene details like footprints. He also employed a dynamometer in his investigations, a tool which gauges just how much force was used in breaking into and entering a residence.Metropolitan Museum of Art Metropolitan Museum of Art Bertillon not only captured the crime scenes and corpses themselves, but made sure to collect exterior shots and views of the streets, alleys, and surrounding areas for his work.Metropolitan Museum of Art The French police officer also took to ballistics analysis with more vigor than his contemporary counterparts.Metropolitan Museum of Art Bertillon used floor grids to his advantage, standardizing their use in his crime scene photography to measure the size of victims and objects. He called this "metric photography."Metropolitan Museum of Art Metropolitan Museum of Art Bertillon's reputation suffered somewhat following a legal scandal in 1894 known as the Dreyfus Affair, during which Captain Alfred Dreyfus, a French artillery officer of Jewish descent, was wrongly charged with treason. The evidence consisted solely of a document that he had allegedly written, which Dreyfus firmly denied.Metropolitan Museum of Art Despite Bertillon's complete lack of expertise in handwriting analysis, he was called as a witness for the prosecution — and testified across two trials that Dreyfus had authored the relevant document. Bertillon stated that the handwriting didn't appear to belong to Dreyfus because he had intentionally disguised his handwriting style.Dreyfus was sentenced to life in prison in a scandal that rocked the Third French Republic for years — until he was exonerated in 1906.
Metropolitan Museum of Art The work of Alphonse Bertillon was largely trounced by the introduction of fingerprint identification in the early 1900s. Nonetheless, his mugshot standard has remained virtually the same for the last 100-plus years.Metropolitan Museum Of Art Alphonse Bertillon died in February 1914, mere months before the beginning of World War I.Metropolitan Museum of Art
33 Chilling Photos Of Vintage Crime Scenes At The Birth Of Forensic Photography View GalleryBefore the advent of fingerprinting or criminal profiling, police departments around the world saw countless criminals slip through the cracks. That is until a French police officer named Alphonse Bertillon found an innovative solution.
Bertillon proffered an eponymous system in which arresting officers measured and described 11 unique physical traits of each suspect, which was to then be filed away with a photograph of their faces.
The profile was so successful at keeping tabs on repeat offenders that the Paris Police adopted it as common practice in 1883. And by 1893, Alphonse Bertillon had standardized the use of what's now known as the modern mugshot across Europe.
But his innovations didn't end there. Bertillon was also the first to document crime scenes through photography. He would frame victims alongside their surrounding objects to properly record scale and dimension before investigators tainted the site.
Take a look at how exactly Alphonse Bertillon revolutionized detective work through these 33 vintage mugshots and crime scene photos.
The Invention Of The Bertillon System
Born on April 22, 1853, in Paris, France, Alphonse Bertillon was raised to appreciate data. Though he was the son of a statistician, Bertillon failed out of school, much to his father's disappointment.
Searching for a career path, Bertillon joined the army as a bugle player at age 26, but his father found him more respectable employment as an entry-level clerk at the Paris Police Station.
Bertillon was tasked with painstakingly rifling through the cellar and copying prisoner admission forms by hand. During this work, he noted stark variations in witness descriptions, which made it difficult for officers to identify and arrest criminals.
Additionally, he realized that even though the Paris police had been using photography to keep track of criminals, the images were all captured in inconsistent lighting and were organized only by name and address. Bertillon realized this had allowed repeat offenders to be misidentified as first-time crooks for years.
Wikimedia CommonsAlphonse Bertillon showcasing his mugshot method on himself.
Alphonse Bertillon thus devised a method to more accurately identify and organize suspects known as forensic anthropometry.
He knew that every human was unique, but this was before the advent of DNA tests, however, so the most effective way to identify someone was through physical measurements. Thus, Bertillon took careful note of 11 unique traits on each criminal.
Soon enough, Paris police were able to sort through their collections of known criminals with ease. From skin tone and hair color to finger length and head circumference, forensic anthropometry was a far better system than rifling through stacks of photos — although these had to be refined, as well.
Alphonse Bertillon did so by standardizing the mugshot and taking photographs of the full face and profile view in uniform lighting. By 1883, Bertillon had taken 7,336 measurements and identified 49 repeat offenders. By 1884, his system caught 241 repeat offenders.
The Invention Of Crime Scene Photography
While efficiently codifying criminal records to the great advantage of the law, Bertillon realized that studying the crime scenes themselves could prove worthwhile in finding serial criminals.
He thus documented crime scenes using a process called "metric photography." This not only kept a visual record of the scenes for later review but also provided investigators with the scales and dimensions of blood spatter or the distances between the victim and nearby objects. Detectives could also work on cases remotely or through time with these photographs.
Bertillon also thought to record the state of a corpse. He was the first to set his tripod up and capture a crime scene from above, documenting the whole room with the corpse in full view. He also took close-ups of the victims.
New York UniversityBertillon at Chicago's 1893 World's Columbian Exposition exhibit of his work.
Naturally, Alphonse Bertillon's crime scene photos and mugshots immortalized him in criminal justice history, and he became one of the first forensic investigators to identify a criminal from fingerprints left at the scene in 1902.
But Bertillon was hesitant to accept other innovations in detective work. He had a particular disdain for handwriting analysis, which led to the largest blemish in his career.
Despite having no experience in the matter, he accepted the call to testify in the trials of Captain Alfred Dreyfus in 1894 and 1899. Dreyfus was charged with espionage but denied penning the incriminating document in question. In a bizarre testimony, Bertillon claimed Dreyfus did write the document, leading to the defendant's life sentence.
Dreyfus was exonerated in 1906, which somewhat marred Alphonse Bertillon's legacy until his death in 1914.
But despite those scandals, Alphonse Bertillon is nonetheless considered one of the fathers of forensic photography and the very first forensic expert in history.
After looking at these macabre crime scene images taken by Alphonse Bertillon, take a look at 28 serial killer crime scene photos from famous murders. Then, learn about six famous unsolved murders and the killers behind them who were never caught.
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