Joe Krakovsky's Reviews > Crime Scene: True-life Forensic Files #2: Profilers And Poison

TRUE-LIFE FORENSIC FILES: POISON, PICTURES, AND PROFILERS is an easy read kids' book but still informative enough for us big kids. Among the topics covered are the forensic team, their function, background information as to the reason for these functions, a dictionary of words from the text, some case files, and how one can become a member of the team. What I thought was a nice touch was that the authors pointed out the need for a good education.

As I read through the chapters I noticed that they often mentioned the team member known as the criminal profiler. It just so happened that we were watching the old US TV series "The Mentalist" as I was reading this. He was a criminal profiler, sort of like Sherlock Holmes, so I really got into this. Another TV show was "Dexter," who studied blood splatter patterns to help solve crimes. These were not the only things I could relate to.

The team members who analyzed samples for evidence used techniques I was familiar with, mainly gas and thin layer chromatography. So I knew what they were talking about. These guys and gals can analyze residue and tell you what kind of accelerator is used in arson, or what kind of poison killed the victim.

By the way, did you know that a special computer crimes profiler helped solve not only a cyber crime but uncovered espionage as well?

Among the case files was something very relevant today. In September of 2004 Viktor Yushchenko, the popular peoples' choice who was running for president of the Ukraine, was poisoned by political enemies friendly to Putin. He lived, and it was never really proven that Putin's people did it, but in the light of recent developments, I would wager that they did.

I think a lot of my adult friends that are interested in crime solving would find this interesting.