Evening Star Newspaper, September 14, 1930, Page 94

THE SUNDAY STAR, WASHINGTON, D. ®, SEPTEMBER ™, 100, 1&he Burcan of Investigation in Washington * . Is Closel 'y Following Extraordinary Work P f Col. Calvin Goddard’s Crime Detection Laboratory at N ortheestern Universit 'y in Chicago, Where the Fictional Methods of Sherlock Holmes Are Being Surpassed in Ingenuity and Put to Practice With Amazing Results. By Rex Collier. EDITOR’'S NOTE: In this, the first inside story of Northwestern Univer- sity’s new scientific crime detection laboratory, Rex Collier, staff reporter of The Evening Star, who is the first newspaper man to be admitled, takes you behind the scenes of this closely guarded sanctum #and discloses the miracles being performed by experts in the scientific crusade against organized crime in the United States. ; RMED with a microscope instead of / a magnifying glass and aided by other marvels of a scientific age, Uncle Sam has fared forth in the guise of a modern Sherlock Holmes to match wits with the most cunning strategists of crime, No longer looked upon merely as the popular detective of fiction, the well known Holmes has become a pioneer in a developing art that looms as society’s greatest hope in the crusade agajnst enemies of law and order. The late Conan Doyle's fascinating character has been scoffed at by beat-pounders and plain- clothes men of the old school, but such recog- nized criminologists of this advanced age as J. Edgar Hoover, director of the United States Bureau of Investigation, and Col. Calvin Goddard are not so skeptical. Hoover has put science to work in his efficient bureau with potable success and Goddard is planning to eclipse the achievements of the capable Sherlock in a remarkable scientific crime detection laboratory just established at Northwestern University in Chicago. HOOVER‘S bureau—Uncle Sam’s outstanding investigative agency—is determined mnot merely to keep pace with underworld ingenuity, but to stay several jumps ahead. In line with that policy, Hoover and his men make it their business to keep themselves informed as to the very latest developments in the battle of Science versus Crime,. i sstacivonn ST B0 S a A ) W here bullets leave their fingerprints on photographic plates, and dust gives incriminating testimony. This progressive precgram led the director to have his bureau officially repre- sented at the extraordinary “crime symposium” held in Chicago recently under auspices of Northwestern University, and to inspect the strange criminological laboratory which God- dard and his associates have established there. J. Edgar Hoover, head of the United States Bureau of Identification in Wash- ington, Uncle Sam’s “Sherlock-Holmes,” and one of the leading advocates of the application of science in crime detec- tion. Northwestern University seems to have taken the lead among the country’s educational in- stitutions in applying the sciences to the very practical field of crime detection. Perhaps its location in Chicago has served to focus its attention on the dire need of an organized Reading the telltale’ story of a fatal bullet. Col. Goddard is using his special - microscope on a slug removed from a murderer’s victim. A test bullet fired from the suspect’s gun is under one of the instrument’s “eyes,” for comparison. scientific crusade against the gangster, the . racketeer and others of that ilk. Diiector Hoover has watched closely the progress of the university’s adventure in this new field. It has been a movement close to his heart, for he has harbored the hope that America would wake up and adopt the Euro- pean standards of crime detection practiced in the scientific police bureaus of Paris, Lon- don, Berlin and Vienna. The scientific police expert long has been recognized abroad as an indispensable factor in the investigation of police mysteries. The large detective bureaus have their own laboratories, adequately staffed with microscopists, chemists, medico-legal ex= perts and other specialists. - America’s police departments have lagged in keeping abreast of these advances. Prejudice against new-fangled ideas has had a lot to do with it, although reluctance of municipalities to provide necessary funds has played a part, too. Most of the research on this side of the Atlantic has been done with private capital. Into this picture now steps Northwestern Uni- versity. HE estimable Sherlock Holmes depended largely on his peculiar powers of percep- tion, his novel processes of elimination and his keen talents of deduction. The university's newly established Scientifie Microphotographie studio of erime laboratory in charge of Frank T. Farrell, shown in picture. Crime Detection Laboratory will discount pere sonal opinion in favor of cold, scientific facts, Facts that reveal themselves only to the eye of the microscope, the spectroscope or the mi- croscopic camera. Facts that assert themselves to the biochemist, the physicist, the medico= legal expert and the authority on forensic bale listics. Facts that, weighed with other known evidence, should enable society to punish the guilty and free the innocent. This “crime clinic” has been set up in & modest building on what is known as McKine lock Campus in East Chicago, overlooking Lake Shore drive. Its destiny has been placed in the hand of a specialist in the fine art of firearms identification, Col. Goddard, U. S. A., Reserve Corps. Col. Goddard, a tall, heavy-set man of genial countenance and businesslike ways, does not at alt fit the popular conception of the hawk-eyed, abrupt Sherlock Holmes. More aptly could he be likened to Holmes' friend and adviser, Dr. Watson. In fact, Col. Goddard some years ago was a follower of Dr. Watson's chosen profes- sion, medicine, having graduated from Johns Hopkins and from the Army Medical School and having served as a surgeon in France, Poland and Germany during and after the World War. It was during his service in the Army that Goddard became interested, at first as a hobby, in the study of small firearms. The hobby bee came an avocation and finally unseated medie cine as Goddard's chief vocation. The new profession—it could scarcely be termed that when Goddard first took it up—brought the Army surgeon an unexpected measure of fame. He became an “expert” in the little explored field of police ballistics, a consultant whose technical testimony concerning fatal guns and bullets was sought by prosecytors and accepted by juries. His services played an important role in the Hall-Mills murder case, in the Sacco- Vanzetti trial and in many other notorious criminal proceedings. ’I‘HEN came the St. Valentine’s day gang mas- sacre in Chicago. Seven followers of “Bugs” Moran lined up against a garage wall and mowed down with the machine guns by rival racketeers. An outraged citizenry, aroused to decisive action, called on Goddard for aid in solving the ghastly crime. Goddard showed that the rain of lead had spurted from two Thompsén sub-machine guns—“Tommiss” the gangsters have dubbed them—and later idene tified two captured guns of that type as the ones used in the slaughter. Northwestern University’s crime laboratory was born of that massacre. The first step in its creation was taken by Dr. Herman N. Bune deson, coroner of Chicago. In conference with a number of the city’s outstanding citizens, the coroner laid plans for a perjnanent crime de- tection bureau, the chief purpose of which af the oufset was to secure Goddard’s services on a year-around basis. “My first thought,” Dr. Bundeson *explained to the writer, “was to establish a crime labora- tory under the municipality, but I soon realized this would not do. Such a laboratory, to be effective, must be outside the pale of politics and divorced from all petty and narrow influe ences. I talked the matter over with a nume ber of prominent men who had interested theme selves in the city’s efforts to abolish gangland, I may mention particularly Bert A. Massee, soap company executive, and Walter E.-Olson, rug manufacturer. Mr. Massee and Mr. Olson were members of the coroner’s jury which in-