Criminal Investigation - A Practical Handbook for Magistrates, Police Officers, and Lawyers E-Book
Hans Gross
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- Herausgeber: Edizioni Savine
- Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
- Sprache: Englisch
- Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2020
The aim of this book is to be as practical as possible. It is not a law book, though we confidently hope that it will be of the greatest interest to lawyers. It is not a work on medical jurisprudence, though we trust that medical men will find it useful and suggestive. It is a Manual of Instruction for all engaged in investigating crime.
The book, following the author’s arrangement, has been divided into four parts. Part I. is designed, in the first place, to enunciate those general principles and qualities, the lack or neglect of which proclaim an investigator unfitted for the sphere in life in which it is his misfortune to be placed ; and, in the second place, to inform him in a general way what assistance science can afford in the investigation of crime, and in a more detailed manner to show in just what cases expert knowledge may be effectively brought to bear. Advice is also given regarding the examination of witnesses and accused and the inspection of localities. Parts II. and III. deal respectively with various heads of knowledge and certain handicrafts with which every Investigating Officer should be thoroughly well acquainted ; while Part IV. gives information upon the methods of criminals in committing particular offences, much of which may be new even to experienced detectives. (1906 – The Authors)
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CRIMINAL INVESTIGATION
A PRACTICAL HANDBOOK
FOR
MAGISTRATES, POLICE OFFICERS, AND LAWYERS
Translated and adapted to Indian and Colonial practice from the
SYSTEM DER KRIMINALISTIK
OF
DR. HANS GROSS,
Professor of Criminology in the University of Prag.
BY
JOHN ADAM, M.A., Barrister-at-Law,
Crown and Public Prosecutor, Madras,
AND
J. COLLYER ADAM, Barrister-at-Law,
Advocate, High Court, Madras.
PREFACE.
This volume is designed to be a working hand-book for all engaged or interested in Criminal Investigation. It has, by special permission, been translated and adapted from the well-known work of Dr. Hans Gross, Professor of Criminology in the University of Prag and special lecturer on that subject in the University of Vienna. Translations have already appeared in various languages, including French, Spanish, Danish, Russian, Hungarian, Servian, and Japanese. Few men are so well fitted, by training and experience, as Dr. Gross to compile a work like the present. He has, to use his own words in his introduction to the first German edition, been for many years “body and soul” an Investigating Officer. As M. Gardeil, Professor of Criminal Law at Nancy, says, in introducing the French Translation to French Criminalists, Dr. Gross is “ an indefatigable observer; a far-seeing psychologist; a magistrate full of ardour to unearth the truth, whether in favour of the accused or against him; a clever craftsman; in turn, draughtsman, photographer, modeller, armourer; having acquired by long experience a profound knowledge of the practices of criminals, robbers, tramps, gipsies, cheats, he opens to us the researches and experiences of many years. His work is no dry or purely technical treatise; it is a living book, because it has been lived.”
The aim of the adaptors has been, while omitting nothing of general or particular utility to any person investigating crime, no matter in what capacity or part of the world, to combine and include therewith a mass of information of peculiar interest in India. At the same time they have attempted to apply many of the illustrative criminal cases and principles contained in the original work to the Indian point of view. Many sections of Dr. Gross's work have been greatly enlarged and elaborated, and no pains have been spared to bring the whole quite up to date.
The book, following the author’s arrangement, has been divided into four parts. Part I. is designed, in the first place, to enunciate those general principles and qualities, the lack or neglect of which proclaim an investigator unfitted for the sphere in life in which it is his misfortune to be placed ; and, in the second place, to inform him in a general way what assistance science can afford in the investigation of crime, and in a more detailed manner to show in just what cases expert knowledge may be effectively brought to bear. Advice is also given regarding the examination of witnesses and accused and the inspection of localities. Parts II. and III. deal respectively with various heads of knowledge and certain handicrafts with which every Investigating Officer should be thoroughly well acquainted ; while Part IV. gives information upon the methods of criminals in committing particular offences, much of which may be new even to experienced detectives.
This Indian and Colonial edition, while omitting some portions of the original which would be of no use to the practical worker, for example, the slang words of Bohemian gipsies, thus contains much new and interesting matter, the better to adapt the book for India and the Colonies, and also to bring the last German edition of 1904 thoroughly up to date. These new passages, derived from the writings of specialists, the latest criminal intelligence, and the somewhat extensive experience of the adaptors as criminal lawyers, are interwoven with the text.
The German and French editions of this work were each published in two volumes. For a book of reference, presenting no definite line of demarcation, the two-volume format is neither convenient nor popular. Any one accustomed to employ as working tools such books as Taylor "On Evidence”, or Taylor's “Medical Jurisprudence”, will cordially agree. At the same time, a great and bulky book is a terrible nuisance. We believe that, with the help of the modern paper-maker, who has provided a thin yet opaque paper, of strong texture and adapted for block-printing, we have been enabled to offer our readers a book, great but not bulky, which will prove no nuisance but a pleasure, physically, to handle and to read.
A word may be said to anticipate the possible criticism that the translation is too free. We have made no attempt to produce a strictly literal interpretation. In translating a classic, where the style and language may be as important as, perhaps more important than, the matter, verbal accuracy may be desiderated; but, where the matter is all in all, we believe its import can be best conveyed through a medium natural to the reader. This is perhaps more especially the case where the original is in German, and from the pen of a German scientist, though we must admit that few German pens are less open to the reproach of German dryness than the lively and often humorous weapon wielded by Dr. Gross. Hence, while neither deprecating. scientific accuracy of treatment nor shirking the limae labor et mora, we have endeavoured to present our results in a language readily understanded of the multitude.
As to the illustrations, those appearing in the German work are reproduced from the original blocks, but a very considerable number are special to this edition. Plates II.— VI. are from original impressions and drawings supplied by the Government of Madras', Plates VII.—XI. are from photographs furnished by Mr. Joseph Farndale, Chief Constable of Bradford, as acknowledged in the text; Figures 40, 41, 42 are copied from Egerton Castle's “Catalogue of Weapons in the Indian Museum, London”; Figures 45, 61—77, 129 and 150 are drawn, by permission of the Inspector-General of Police, Madras, from examples preserved in the Museum attached to his Office. The botanical drawings, Figures 116— 121 and 126—128, have been prepared from specimens procured with the assistance of Lt. Col. J. L. Van Geyzel, I. M. S., Chemical Examiner to the Government of Madras. The plants portrayed in Figures 122—125, not being readily obtainable in Madras, recourse was had to the illustrations in Lyon's Medical Jurisprudence, so frequently referred to in the text. The blocks, both half-tone and line, for all the illustrations here specifically mentioned and also for Figure 82, have been executed by the Methodist Episcopal Press, Madras. The blocks for Figures 43, 44, 46—50, 52, 53, 55, were lent by Messrs. Oakes & Co., Ltd., the well-known gunsmiths of Madras. To all collaborators here mentioned our cordial thanks are due.
Many works of experts have been referred to and from some of these excerpts have been made, we trust to no unreasonable extent. We believe that no quotation or extract has been taken from any author without acknowledgment in loco, and we have endeavoured so to frame our selections that they may prove signposts, guiding the reader from our pages to the fountainhead.
Despite the most assiduous care on the part of both editors and printers’ readers, we fear many press errors have crept in; for these, and all other deficiencies, we can only plead the difficulties attending the production of a First Edition of a work of this nature, and hope that, with the aid of our friendly critics, they may be amended, should a Second Edition be called for. In this connection we have specially to thank Lt. Col. J. L. Van Geyzel, already mentioned, for kindly reading the proof sheets of Chapter XVI, sections viii and ix; and Chapter XVIII, section ii, sub-section 2, and making many valuable suggestions. Our thanks are also due to Mr. K. S. Gopalratnam Iyer, B.A., B.L., who has carefully read the final proof-sheets of a great portion of the book.
In conclusion, we trust no one will imagine that the author and editors claim for this work either completeness or finality. The extent of the subject forbids the former, the nature of it vetoes the latter. In remedying its deficiencies and imperfections, we hope to receive the assistance of all who take a living interest in the subject. Such support has enabled Dr. Gross to enlarge his work to its present dimensions, and to furnish it with a comrade in the shape of his “Archiv fur Kriminal-Anthropologie und Kriminalistik”, now in its twenty-fourth volume. Any information or suggestion, no matter on how small a point, will be thankfully received by us and utilised for rendering any future issue more serviceable and thoroughly up-to-date.
JOHN ADAM.
J. COLLYER ADAM.
INTRODUCTION.
The aim of this book is to be as practical as possible. It is not a law book, though we confidently hope that it will be of the greatest interest to lawyers. It is not a work on medical jurisprudence, though we trust that medical men will find it useful and suggestive. It is a Manual of Instruction for all engaged in investigating crime, its aim being, not only to deal in detail with subjects coming directly within the province of a criminal investigator, but also to inform that official in what cases and in what manner specialists may or must be resorted to. At what stage of the inquiry the role of the expert begins, depends almost entirely upon the person conducting the inquiry. If the latter is unaware, for example, that a chemist can bring out with the help of his science an almost invisible impression of a finger upon a drinking glass, there is small chance of the drinking glass either being examined or ever reaching the chemist’s hands. An investigator with a fair equipment of knowledge will be aware, almost instinctively, just when to invoke the assistance of experts in many cases wherein another would not dream of doing so.
We of course foresee and meet on the threshold the charge of encroaching upon the province, and thereby attempting to dispense with the help, of specialists. Nothing could be more harmful than such advice, nothing could so expose the investigator to mistakes as such fancied independence. But there is a vast gulf between permitting an Investigating Officer to undertake work beyond his sphere and instructing him how to recognise when he ought to resort to experts, what experts should be chosen, and what questions must be submitted to them; just as an attorney requires long training and much knowledge of law to be able to state his case effectively for the opinion of the advocate. Cuilibet in sua arte perito credendum est.
As a rule, these three considerations alone will present themselves. But there are also cases, nor are they extremely rare, where the Investigating Officer must himself play the role of expert.
1. In all cases where no real experts exist and where a little reflection alone is required ; e.g., in cases of falsification of documents, as to inaccuracies, anachronisms, inconsistencies, in the text as a whole, unless the case has to do with documents of such age as to necessitate the aid of experts in history or genealogy. Other instances are the observation of footprints, the deciphering of writing, questions concerning superstition, etc.
2. In the numerous cases where, no expert being at hand, it is necessary for the Investigating Officer to act without delay, for example, make an arrest, conduct a search, or revisit the scene of a crime. The Investigating Officer is often placed in such a situation. Out in the country, it happens as often as not that no qualified medical man is to be found in the place ; or it may be that the nature of the case itself precludes the Investigating Officer from at once consulting a medical man, though medical knowledge would be of great assistance to him. There are again cases in which the Investigating Officer is obliged to journey far into his district. He cannot take a medical man with him from head-quarters in all such cases, in fact his first information may not show the slightest necessity for one. Suppose for example a District or Assistant Superintendent of Police is summoned to what is reported to be a very important case of arson, necessitating his personal investigation. He goes off 30, 40, or even 50 miles, away into the wilds of his district and discovers that the arson has apparently been committed to conceal a murder or an attempted murder. He has to decide whether an incinerated corpse is that of a murdered man or of one accidentally burnt in the fire. He has no medical expert with him—he has no means of getting one within a reasonable time—he is under the necessity of at once coming to some conclusion on the matter—he must rely entirely upon his own special knowledge; his method of procedure at this moment will have the very greatest influence upon the result of the inquiry.
3. Finally and not the least important, especially as regards India, experts of the first rank are seldom to be found. The Chemical Examiners to Government, the Lecturers on Medical Jurisprudence at Headquarters, the Government Experts in Finger-prints, know well just what they have to say and do and how to say and do it; but the same cannot be affirmed of the ordinary country hospital assistant or apothecary, who is perhaps only at the outset of his career and indeed can seldom be called an expert at all. In some parts of India the danger is all the greater, when, as in the Presidency of Madras, hospital assistants are called upon to make post-mortems, to draw up reports, and give evidence in important murder trials. The ordinary official of this grade does so without the slightest hesitation, makes statements and draws conclusions with the utmost rashness, declining to admit his inability to reply to a question a far more experienced man would shrink from answering, and entirely forgetting that the life of a fellow human being may be dependent on his words. This is no random assertion; the records of our Criminal Courts amply bear it out, and high medical authority could be quoted for the opinion that no non-gazetted medical officer, i. e., no one below the rank of Assistant-Surgeon, should be permitted to conduct a postmortem examination in a suspicious case and make a report thereon. Frequently medical men, even men of long experience, have never learnt the art of drawing up a satisfactory report in a criminal matter. They may know their trade thoroughly and be able to give most useful information, but are incapable in a criminal matter of applying their knowledge and answering questions put to them with any precision. Without the slightest intention of frustrating the ends of justice, they fall victims to the wiles of the expert cross-examiner, losing both their heads and their tempers. Finally a workman, a shikari, or a cultivator cannot be expected to find just the correct expression or to put into words exactly what he desires to say, especially from the point of view of the Investigating Officer. It must never be forgotten that the best of experts is far from being a criminalist. The Investigating Officer must therefore know something more than what is set out in the Codes, if he wants to obtain answers to the point. And if he is entirely ignorant on all matters connected with outside knowledge, he cannot gain that assistance from specialists which they would otherwise be able to afford.
The reason of the remarkable success of the original of this book in Europe is due to the circumstance, forcibly stated by M. Gardeil, already quoted, that “ it responds to a real demand ; it fills a gap, which not only existed in the juristic literature of Germany, but exists to-day in France and most other countries.” The realization of the same lacuna led the Congress of the International Union of Criminal Law, held at Linz, August 2595, to pass the following Resolution :—“ In order that criminal investigators may be better trained and educated for the work before them, it is desirable that the texts of the criminal codes should not be the sole subjects of instruction; it is to be hoped that—by special courses of instruction or otherwise—wider and deeper notions may be imparted to them on the general causes of crime, the striking peculiarities of the criminal world, and the best methods to adopt in criminal inquiries and the infliction of penalties”.
We most cordially endorse the view here formulated. An Investigating Officer requires in the execution of his duties very much more knowledge than can be given him by the Codes, supplemented by annotations and case law. No doubt the Investigating Officer can find much of the requisite information in a mass of books, yet some is to be found nowhere; as to the books themselves, they are not always to his hand, and when he has them at his disposition, he speedily realizes that a man without some knowledge of a subject cannot intelligently use a scientific manual. It is impossible for him to find the notions he is in need of, united in one systematic whole; and he has often neither time nor opportunity to question anyone in a position to give him information. He is thus generally compelled to fall back on his own resources, or on some guide easy to consult and capable of giving him the starting point necessary in the majority of cases that arise. In fact he wants a book of “First Aid”. The present volume is intended to be such an auxiliary; in any event we trust that the beginner will find in it a practical guide, at least for the outset, on his journey, and possibly even through the inevitable slough of despond.
We should not here overlook the valuable work now being done in practical training by the Police Schools, recently established in many parts of India. We trust both teachers and pupils in such Institutions will find something useful in our pages.
When the scheme of the book first took shape, the idea was to have the different parts treated by specialists: medical jurisprudence by a physician and surgeon, the science of arms by an armourer, the chapter on photography by a photographer, etc. We must allow that if treated in this way the various chapters would have been set out in a more scientific manner; but it soon appeared that we should miss our true aim ; there are in fact enough works on such subjects, but unhappily they have not been written for the Investigating Officer or with the aim he pursues kept steadily in view, the result being that he cannot find what he has immediate need of. The specialist cannot place himself in the position and stead of the jurist, who, without being a specialist beyond his own profession, ought nevertheless to possess special information; the expert can teach him many things, but not those just necessary. This plan was therefore abandoned and the work has been written throughout by the author and the adaptors, profitting, it is thankfully acknowledged by the abundant labours of others, supplemented at every turn by personal research and experience.
For various reasons some subjects of interest to an Investigating Officer have not been treated of exhaustively: a full discussion would encroach too extensively upon subjects outside his province, would be beyond the compass of a handbook, or perhaps prove profitable to the criminal classes and so harmful to the public.
We may here enter a perhaps unnecessary caveat against any supposition that Investigating Officers are expected immediately to sit down and “ cram ” this book from beginning to end or at once to attain the ideal of an Investigating Officer promulgated in Chapter I. That is in truth an “ ideal ”, a “ counsel of perfection ”—but if there were no mountain tops who could exclaim Excelsior ?
The object of the book then is to show how crime is to be handled, investigated, and accounted for, to explain the motives at work and the objects to be attained. The legal aspect of arson, for example, and the punishment appropriate thereto, the principles of the criminal law, the laws of evidence, and the rules of procedure to be followed in the trial of a case are barely within our limits ; but how the arson was accomplished, what means and assistance the incendiary had at his disposal, how its origin may be accounted for, the character of the criminal and—here comes in criminal psychology—the weight to be attached to the testimony of the witnesses, the consideration of errors in observation and deduction, to which judge, jury, and all who have to deal with crime, are exposed,— these things are part and parcel of our subject.
Abstract legal knowledge is practically worthless where the Judge, Magistrate, or Policeman cannot make it fit in with facts, when he does not understand the witnesses, or appreciates them erroneously, when he assesses wrongly the worth of sense perceptions, when he is led astray by every bit of roguery, when he does not know how to make use of traces left behind by the criminal, and especially when he does not know the numberless facts systematised in Criminal Phenomenology.
It must be admitted that at the present day the value of the deposition of even a truthful witness is much over-rated. The numberless errors in perceptions derived from the senses, the faults of memory, the far-reaching differences in human beings as regards age, sex, nature, culture, mood of the moment, health, passionate excitement, environment, all these things have so great an effect that we scarcely ever receive two quite similar accounts of one thing; and between what people really experience and what they confidently assert, we find only error heaped upon error. Out of the mouths of two witnesses we may arrive at the real truth, we may form for ourselves an idea of the circumstances of an occurrence and satisfy ourselves concerning it, but the evidence will seldom be true and material; and whoever goes more closely into the matter will not silence his conscience, even after listening to ten witnesses. Evil design and artful deception, mistakes and errors, most of all the closing of the eyes and the belief that what is stated in evidence has really been seen, are characteristics of so very many witnesses, that absolutely unbiassed testimony can hardly be imagined. If Criminal Psychology teaches us this much, so the other parts of the subject show us the value of facts, where they can be obtained, how they can be held fast and appraised—these things are just as important as to show what can be done with the facts when obtained. The trace of a crime discovered and turned to good account, a correct sketch be it ever so simple, a miscroscopic slide, a deciphered correspondence, a photograph of a person or object, a tatooing, a restored piece of burnt paper, a careful survey, a thousand more material things are all examples of incorruptible, disinterested, and enduring testimony from which mistaken, inaccurate, and biassed perceptions, as well as evil intention, perjury, and unlawful co-operation, are excluded. As the science of Criminal Investigation proceeds, oral testimony falls behind and the importance of realistic proof advances; “circumstances cannot lie”, witnesses can and do. The upshot is that when the case comes for trial we may call as many witnesses as we like, but the realistic or, as lawyers call them, circumstantial proofs must be collected, compared, and arranged beforehand, so that the chief importance will attach not so much to the trial itself as to the Preliminary Inquiry.
The truth of this is but too often apparent in India, and can well be exemplified by the procedure of High Court Judges hearing Criminal Appeals. Their first act on taking up the papers is to examine, with the greatest care and so far as the often very incomplete record will permit, the progress of the inquiry; and if serious flaws are found therein, as not infrequently is the case, they attach little or no weight to the depositions of the witnesses at the trial.
We venture to hope that this book will be of use to many besides Investigating Officers properly so called. Throughout the work the expression “ Investigating Officer ” is used as a compendious term to include all persons engaged in the investigation, official or non-official, of criminal cases. In India an inquiry is conducted sometimes by Magistrates (under Chapter XIV of the Criminal Procedure Code), sometimes by the Police (under the same Chapter and the various Police Acts), sometimes by interested parties, assisted, more or less, by their legal advisers. To all these classes, as well as to judges of all ranks and medical officers of all grades, this work is intended to appeal.
We may remind our readers that the subject with which this book deals in part, Criminal Phenomenology, is but one branch of the wider science of Criminology. The study of this subject has not been taken up by English-speaking nations with any sincerity of purpose or vigour of attack. One or two explorers, indeed, have grappled with the subject, but the text books used are for the most part those of other nations— Italy, France, Germany. Even in the United States, lawyers have chiefly directed their attention to what is known as Criminal Politics. This subject—it can hardly be called a branch of Criminology, standing as it does on a footing of its own—comprises two sub-branches; firstly the science of the criminal law, which indeed all nations have been forced to consider, and secondly penology, the science that treats of the punishment and prevention of crime and of the management of prisons and reformatories. America has attempted, and with considerable success, to define the principles upon which the infliction of punishment should be based, and the exposition by her lawyers of the principles of the criminal law has been accepted and admired both in England and in India. The Italian School has dived deep down into the psychological branch of criminology and has propounded many original ideas, but according to the general opinion of European criminologists it has to some extent lost sight of the practical in its desire to carry its pet theories to a never attainable conclusion. French criminologists on the other hand have studied the subject from a more utilitarian point of view, paying particular attention to what is termed Phenomenology.
It is, however, to the German speaking races we must turn to find Criminology thoroughly attacked in all its branches. This science has been by them recognised as a subject for really serious study, and very few German Universities do not possess a chair of Criminology, with courses of lectures and classes thereon. The appended table gives the scheme drawn up by a recognised authority, and shows the place occupied by Phenomenology in the syllabus.
Note.—As these pages are passing through the press we are in receipt of a work just published, Psychology applied to Legal Evidence, by G. F. Arnold, I. C. S. We regret we can do no more here than welcome it as an original and interesting contribution to the science of Criminal Psychology.
“ What is truth ? said jesting Pilate; and would not stay for an answer...........Yet truth, which only doth judge itself, teacheth that the inquiry of truth, which is the lovemaking or wooing of it, the knowledge of truth, which is the presence of it, and the belief of truth, which is the enjoying of it, is the sovereign good of human nature
PART I.—GENERAL.
CHAPTER I.
THE INVESTIGATING OFFICER.
Section i.—General Considerations.
Of all the duties that an official can be called upon to perform in the course of his service those of an Investigating Officer are certainly not the least important. That his services to the public are great and his labours full of interest will be generally admitted, but rarely, even among specialists, is full credit given to the difficulties of the position. An Investigating Officer must possess the vigour of youth, energy ever on the alert, robust health, and extensive acquaintance with all branches of the law. He ought to know men, proceed skilfully, and possess liveliness and vigilance. Tact is indispensable, true courage is required in many situations, and he must be always ready on emergency to risk his health and life; as when dangerous criminals are to be dealt with, fatiguing journeys to be undertaken, persons stricken with infectious diseases to be examined, or dangerous post-mortems attended. He has moreover to solve problems relating to every conceivable branch of human knowledge; he ought to be acquainted with languages, he should know what the medical man can tell him and what he should ask the medical man; he must be as conversant with the dodges of the poacher as with the wiles of the stock jobber, as well acquainted with the method of fabricating a will as with the cause of a railway accident; he must know the tricks of card-sharpers, why boilers explode, how a horse-coper can turn an old screw into a young hunter. He should be able to pick his way through account books, to understand slang, to read ciphers, and be familiar with the processes and tools of all classes of workmen.
But it is not on the day of his appointment alone that an Investigating Officer can learn all this or acquire the activity and perspicacity necessary to his work. It ought therefore to be a fundamental rule not to nominate as Investigating Officer any but those who, besides their mental and bodily fitness, possess a veritable encyclopaedic culture, who know the world, have observed life, and have acquired manifold experiences; finally, who are ready to place at the service of society with all the energy of which they are capable the knowledge thus painfully acquired. Every criminal expert knows that the Investigating Officer in the exercise of his functions may be compelled to draw on all, absolutely all, the varied knowledge he has amassed, and that he will feel at least once in his life a profound regret for his ignorance of what he has neglected to acquire.
If an Investigating Officer is wanting in such general information, the cause is lack of interest in the work; and in this case he will never make a good Investigating Officer. He will do well to seek without delay to utilize his legal knowledge, which may perhaps be of great value, in other branches of judicial work. As an Investigating Officer he will not only fail to play his role well but his life will be miserable; he will be definitely forced to busy himself with affairs that do not interest him and, being deficient in the necessary information, he will never secure good results. He will be obliged to confess, sooner or later, that he is not occupying a situation suitable to him; and nothing is more discouraging to a man than work under such conditions. He who would spare himself such disappointment ought to make sure of possessing the qualities indispensable to an Investigating Officer before entering on this thorny and difficult career.
But knowledge alone is not everything. The Investigating Officer must possess not only legal and other acquirements, a general training, special fitness, and ideas ever ready for development, but also such a complete devotion to his profession that even outside the exercise of his official functions he will be always seeking to learn something calculated to extend his knowledge. He who seeks to learn only when some notable crime turns up, will have great difficulty in learning anything at all. His knowledge should be acquired beforehand by constant application in his ordinary life. Every day, nay every moment, he must be picking up something in touch with his work. Thus the zealous Investigating Officer will note on his walks the footprints found on the dust of the highway; he will observe the tracks of animals, of the wheels of carriages, the marks of pressure on the grass where someone has sat or lain down, or perhaps deposited a burden. He will examine little pieces of paper that have been thrown away, marks or injuries on trees, displaced stones, broken glass or pottery, doors and windows open or shut in an unusual manner. Every thing will afford an opportunity for drawing conclusions and explaining what must have previously taken place. For what we call ‘‘adducing proof” consists only in concluding from the knowledge of one fact the knowledge of other facts which must have followed or preceded it. And these lessons must be learned in advance in connection with matters of small importance and not waited for until some murder has to be investigated. Quite insignificant words uttered by passers by, striking the ear by chance, or little suspicious acts accidentally observed, may afford precious opportunities for putting two and two together. It is equally useful to get others to relate events, insignificant or important, at which they as well as oneself have been present. These recitals, supposing that those who make them really wish to speak the truth, are extremely interesting on account of their variations; and this is the simplest and indeed only way of learning how the depositions of witnesses should be appreciated.
Nor ought the budding Investigating Officer to neglect any opportunity of obtaining information concerning any profession, the work of an artisan, technical processes, etc., etc., nor, last not least, of learning to know men. For this every man with whom we come in contact may be taken as an object of study, and whoever takes the trouble can always learn something from the biggest fool.
Section ii.—The Duties of the Investigating Officer.
If we now ask “ How should the Investigating Officer set about his work?” we can come to but one conclusion “His whole heart must be set upon success.” If not, he reduces his work to the mere dispatching of documents and firing off reports as fast as he can. If he would succeed in each inquiry his work will be by no means easy, Smooth, or peaceful; on the contrary, he will have to devote himself completely and continually to his task, working with all his might and never pausing for rest.
Nervous people are useless as investigators. Success in a mission means the complete elucidation of the business in hand. No matter what may be his profession, a man must, if he be conscientious, bring his task to a successful termination. But here is not a task in which one can advance little by little, along a natural and clearly demarcated route, terminating when one has completed a certain amount of work mapped out in advance ; there is always a new problem to unravel ; the investigator whose work is half done has accomplished nothing. Either he has solved the question and quite finished the work ; that means success : or he has done nothing, absolutely nothing.
“ Obtaining a result ” must not be confused with “ producing an effect.” The work of the investigator ought to make neither noise nor sensation: suffice it that the culprit must be discovered at any price. To succeed in his mission the Investigating Officer must just commence his work at the start with the resolution of devoting to it every effort humanly possible and the determination not to pause till it is finished. The end has not been attained simply by the elucidation of the affair in an ordinary way. It is very easy and convenient to say, “ It is impossible to go further.” But if one says continually, “Another step in advance must be taken,” one finishes by advancing several leagues. In every case that he has to solve the Investigating Officer has first to obtain facts, often not without worry and trouble. As adversaries he has the accused, and often the witnesses, circumstances, natural events, difficulties that crop up as time goes on ; and if he loses sight of the proverb, “If you don’t allow yourself to be beaten to-day, you are saved a hundred times over,” then on the first difficulty arising he will throw up the sponge. He will take a difficulty for an impossibility and say “ Thus far and no further.”
Section iii.—The Procedure of the Investigating Officer.
When the Investigating Officer starts work, the most important point for him is to discover the exact moment when he can form a definite opinion. The importance of this cannot be too much insisted upon, for upon it often depends, and in difficult cases almost always, success or failure. If he should come too soon to a definite conclusion relating to the affair, a preconceived opinion will be formed, to which he will always be attached with more or less tenacity till he is forced to abandon it entirely: but his most precious moments will by then have passed away, the best clues will have been lost, often beyond the possibility of recovery. If on the other hand he misses the true moment for forming an opinion, the inquiry becomes a purposeless groping in the dark and a search devoid of aim. When will the Investigating Officer find this true moment, this psychological instant, of which we speak? it is impossible to lay down a general rule or to foresee in a given case: all that can be said is, that the Investigating Officer will of necessity always find it if he set to work under the guidance of fixed and immutable principles, never losing sight of the fact that a “ definite opinion ” on an affair as a whole will not come to him all of a sudden; to arrive at it he must advance step by step while making use of such “definite opinions” as may be prudently formed about phenomena, facts, and isolated events as they arise.
The case must be taken up from the start with an open mind. The complaint or information received by the Investigating Officer ought to have no other value in his eyes than this statement, “It is said that such and such a crime has been committed at such and such a place.” Even if details about the perpetrator, the injury, the motive, etc., are published, he should attach no more importance to them than if he had heard the remark, “it is said that the affair must have happened thus”. Supposing that an important crime is involved and the Investigating Officer repairs to the scene, certainly a great number of strong and lively i impressions will bring themselves to bear upon him and the task of gathering them together will be hard enough. In addition, he will receive communications from all quarters; officials, authorised and unauthorised, desire to make statements more or less important; he does not wish to pack them off, for they may tell him something which he will be able to turn to account in forming at once, if he is so disposed, a definite opinion. His work at this important stage of the inquiry must enter into great detail; just as if he gathered up with a sponge one by one all the drops of water he sees, in order, when it is quite soaked, to squeeze into a basin all the drops that have been collected. No matter for the moment whether the drops are clear liquid or dirty slush, he gathers them all in. Little by little as the work advances, certain opinions and ideas become separated and fixed : such or such a witness makes a good impression and one begins to believe what he states ; one gets an idea of the way in which the author of the crime reached the spot; one takes account of the instruments he has employed ; or finds certain indications which confine within ever narrower limits the period of time in which the deed must have been committed.
When a certain number of ideas on the incidents of the case, considered individually, seem at length determined, the Investigating Officer will seek to obtain a precise idea of the way in which everything has happened, even if only the most general view be possible. Perhaps the conclusion will be forced on one that the real facts are not what they appear on the surface and that a false complexion has been given to them ; or on the other hand one may be enabled to say with certainty that a crime of such or such a nature has been committed. In short the Investigating Officer will be far enough advanced to set up an outline or frame work on which a provisional theory or scheme may be developed. To set out this scheme beforehand will be superfluous and dangerous; superfluous because it may have to be changed at any moment, dangerous because with a prematurely formed plan one can easily get off the track and follow a wrong direction. We do not imply that the Investigating Officer must not at the beginning establish a classification to be followed in his operations, for without that he would only grope about, finding nothing and advancing nowhither: but between a provisional classification to guide inquiry and a definite scheme of the crime there is a great difference.
But if it is difficult to construct the plan of campaign, it is still more difficult to conduct the inquiry according to that plan. One cannot compare the scheme of inquiry with a scheme devised in view of circumstances which can be brought into existence and modified at will. It is drawn up in view of circumstances which alter of themselves, which are often unknown, and which do not depend on the person applying the scheme. It resembles, not the design of a house to be built, but a plan of campaign. It is based upon data which the Investigating Officer possesses, or believes himself to possess, when he constructs it. It must be rigidly adhered to as long as these data are unchanged or have undergone only their natural development, but it must be modified in part or in whole as soon as these data are found to have changed or to be false. One would imagine that this could be done quite naturally and spontaneously, but such is human nature that so simple a principle is rarely conformed to.
The greater difficulty there is in securing anything, the more one holds on to it; that is why fools are so obstinate. They never willingly abandon an idea, because they have had trouble in getting it into their heads. Now the scheme of an inquiry is difficult to follow out, and, when one has already worked in conformity therewith, it is not willingly abandoned ; but still pursued unthinkingly and almost automatically. It happens at times that one perceives all of a sudden in one’s work that one is following with exact minuteness a plan based upon data the falsity of which has become apparent long ago, or which are so modified that the work constructed, if not built altogether in the air, is quite crooked. This advice may seem pedantic: yet, however unimportant an inquiry may be at each step (examination of witnesses, visits to localities, technical or expert reports, and even combinations spontaneously imagined), the information upon which one’s scheme has been based, must be verified anew, to ascertain if the data remain unchanged and, if not, in what way the scheme must be modified.
It will therefore be not only the easiest but usually also the best and safest way to construct the hypothesis in the simplest possible manner. Strange and extraordinary suppositions should be disregarded. And never forget that one great stupid fault which a criminal nearly always commits, especially in big crimes. It has happened hundreds of times that criminal investigators, already on the right track, have left it thinking: “ The man who has committed this crime cannot have been so foolish as to do that,” but innumerable cases prove that he has been so foolish ; it matters not whether he was confused, suddenly frightened, has made a miscalculation, acted hastily, or what not. It is therefore always best for the Investigating Officer to take the simplest view at the outset.
Pfister in his “Curious Criminal Cases” rightly says:—“The greatest art of the Investigating Officer consists in conducting the inquiry in such a way that the initiated at once perceive that there has been “a directing intelligence,” while the uninitiated imagine that every thing has fallen into place of its own accord.” But in order to perceive this “ directing intelligence,” the whole must rest upon a scheme continually verified and thoroughly carried out. How often do we not come across inquiries where the Investigating Officer has started on an excellent plan, but has adhered to it with desperate tenacity even when the data upon which it was based have long since changed. Thus to continue to follow a line the falsity of which has been demonstrated, may sometimes prove more fatal and more dangerous than to grope about with no plan at all: in the latter case it is still possible to hit the right clue, in the former it is absolutely impossible. The case where an inquiry runs the greatest risk of failure is when the scheme supposes a certain person to have been the author of the crime; and after having worked entirely with this idea, it suddenly becomes evident that that person is innocent.
When an almost incalculable amount of time has been lost on such a false scent, it may be concluded as a general rule that the inquiry will prove abortive. The Investigating Officer has expressed his ideas on the manner in which things have come about, he has utilised the elements of proof in view of a predetermined result, and, what is graver still, he has allowed time to slip away. And now his original supposition has been found to be false; he has first to combat his own discouragement and that of his assistant: if a new scheme is drawn up he cannot muster the same degree of interest, and the elements of proof seem neither so certain nor so useful. Many have disappeared and can no longer be found, and with each production of new proofs he will make the objection, or others will make it for him, that in the original scheme they would have borne another meaning and pointed to another conclusion. There is only one way to obviate such a danger, never to allow himself to be dominated exclusively by one idea and never to follow exclusively that sole idea.
In the preceding pages the title ‘Investigating Officer’ has, as explained in the preface, been used in a comprehensive sense, but it will be well to point out that there may be two or more Investigators. In India in particular, the Criminal Procedure Code, in addition to taking care that the Magistrate possessing jurisdiction should be kept constantly in touch with the labour of the police, provides both for an “Investigation ” by a police officer and an “Inquiry” by a Magistrate [Section 4, (k) and (l)]. These may be going on simultaneously, and if there be friction or jealousy between the two authorities, only the most sanguine would hope for success. But let us assume—and we trust the assumption is permissible—that both are working together with a single eye to promote the ends of justice. That he may develop or modify his plans in the way described, the Magistrate, to economise his forces, must have, understand, and know how to make use of, his associates and subordinates. It is common enough to hear the remarks, “ The Magistrate is not a policeman”; “That is police work”; “The Magistrate has something else to do.” Those who adopt this tone can hardly quote in its favour success scored by them. The Magistrate of course ought not personally to interfere in matters which do not concern him ; but he should keep the reins in his hands and guide the whole team; whatever the police do ought to fit in with the scheme of the Magistrate. The actual work may at times have to be done by the police alone, but the police should work strictly under the directions of the Magistrate.
The police are sometimes found in a false position in being placed either too high or too low. Too low, when the Magistrate deems it useless to march abreast of the police, does not desire to work with them, and draws, between their work and his, too deep and inflexible a line of demarcation. Too high, when the Magistrate accords the police complete independence, lets them have all their own way, and afterwards accepts as absolutely definite and certain what has been done solely on their own responsibility. The police will be found in their proper place only when the Magistrate coordinates the efforts of both, works sympathetically with them in the recognised interests of justice, keeps them well acquainted with all he has done and all he intends to do; when in short he has but one ambition, to bring the work to a successful conclusion. But if on the one side the Magistrate thus marches hand in hand without jealousy, he must on the other firmly demand that the control of the inquiry be placed immediately and completely in his hands; that nothing be done without his knowledge, and that every thing he has ordered be carried out in the way prescribed. Every police officer who has his duty at heart, should willingly accept this situation. The ends of justice will be furthered, and the Magistrate will have at his disposal men devoted to him, and, because they have confidence in him, working well and expeditiously. But the Magistrate must know his men, not only know their worth in a general way, but know what they are thinking about in each particular case.
That these principles are by no means chimerical as regards India was the view of the Police Commission of 1903. The following sentences from its Report (Sections 124 and 125) may be aptly quoted to enforce by authority what has been advanced above. After referring to the various Sections of the Code of Criminal Procedure in which the respective functions of the Magistracy and Police are enumerated, the Report proceeds:
“ This is the connection which the law intends to exist between the Magistrate empowered to take cognizance of police cases and the police. It involves the first information being sent to this Magistrate, his being able to watch the case from the first, to order investigation where the police are not investigating, or to proceed to take up the case himself, and his being kept in touch with the police investigation up to the very last. His connection with the case is intended to begin with the first information and to continue to the end: throughout he is intended to exercise an intelligent interest in it. These provisions are very generally lost sight of. The intention of the law is defeated when the first information is sent, not as required by Section 157 to the Magistrate having jurisdiction, but nominally to the District Magistrate, really to a Court Inspector or other official at headquarters, who files it until the case is sent up finally for trial. It is also defeated when the Magistrate assumes what he imagines to be a judicial attitude, and never looks at a paper or takes any interest in the case until it comes before him in Court, and proceeds to dispose of it with regard only to what is put before him by the parties without any effort to do what more he can to arrive at the truth. A valuable check on Police work and valuable powers in criminal administration are thus lost.
“ The intention of the law is that the police and the magistracy should work together, the former investigating the case for the Magistrate, and the latter conducting the magisterial inquiry or trial, weighing the evidence collected by the police, sifting further any points that have been missed or inadequately treated, hearing all that the accused has to say or adduce on his own behalf, and deciding the case in the interests of truth and justice. That the Magistrate should be unduly ready to accept the police view of a case without giving the accused a fair hearing and endeavouring to sift the case to the bottom is unjust and contrary to the intention of the law. It is equally unjust and contrary to the intention of the law for a Magistrate to assume a hostile attitude towards the police, to deny them a fair hearing, or to be diverted from the endeavour to ascertain the truth by a prejudice against them.”
