Books in Brief: The Evidence Never Lies

The Evidence Never Lies: The Casebook of a Modern Sherlock Holmes, by Alfred Allan Lewis with Herbert Leon MacDonell (Holt, Rinehart, 288 pp., $16.95)

‘How often have I said to you,” Sherlock Holmes lectured Watson in The Sign of Four, “that when you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.” After perusing the career of Herbert MacDonell, a former glass-company technician turned criminalist, “the newest breed of detective,” one can only assume the earlier detective would have recognized in him a kindred spirit. For Mr. MacDonell, according to his biographer, Alfred Allan Lewis, “has been consulted on almost every criminal case of national significance,” including the Black Panther affair (discussed at length). His invention of the Magna brush has simplified the processing of fingerprints; his collection of fingernail parings represents a quarter-century’s accumulation (he believes no two are alike); and he has, with good reason, been tagged “the Sherlock Holmes of bloodstain evidence.” Uncovering evidence “and making it speak to him was what he truly loved . . . and he vowed that he would always let the evidence speak for itself. . . . Evidence was beautiful and logical, leading … to objective truth.” A variety of murder cases, from Florida to Oregon, to which MacDonell applied his expertise are analyzed and skillfully narrated by Mr. Lewis. There is no index or bibliography and, more deplorably, no photographs. But, for your Quincy aficionado, this one will stand comparison with Sir Sydney Smith’s Mostly Murder (1960).

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The Evidence Never Lies: The Casebook of a Modern Sherlock Holmes, by Alfred Allan Lewis with Herbert Leon MacDonell (Holt, Rinehart, 288 pp., $16.95)

‘How often have I said to you,” Sherlock Holmes lectured Watson in The Sign of Four, “that when you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.” After perusing the career of Herbert MacDonell, a former glass-company technician turned criminalist, “the newest breed of detective,” one can only assume the earlier detective would have recognized in him a kindred spirit. For Mr. MacDonell, according to his biographer, Alfred Allan Lewis, “has been consulted on almost every criminal case of national significance,” including the Black Panther affair (discussed at length). His invention of the Magna brush has simplified the processing of fingerprints; his collection of fingernail parings represents a quarter-century’s accumulation (he believes no two are alike); and he has, with good reason, been tagged “the Sherlock Holmes of bloodstain evidence.” Uncovering evidence “and making it speak to him was what he truly loved . . . and he vowed that he would always let the evidence speak for itself. . . . Evidence was beautiful and logical, leading … to objective truth.” A variety of murder cases, from Florida to Oregon, to which MacDonell applied his expertise are analyzed and skillfully narrated by Mr. Lewis. There is no index or bibliography and, more deplorably, no photographs. But, for your Quincy aficionado, this one will stand comparison with Sir Sydney Smith’s Mostly Murder (1960).