In 1912 forensics was still in its infancy when a pretty girl was found dead in her parent’s parlour. Her boyfriend was the immediate suspect, but he had an alibi that couldn’t be broken. Here’s how make-up, and the people who analyze it, broke it…
When police questioned Gourbin, he smoothly produced a big group of friends who could verify his whereabouts at exactly the time Marie was murdered. They had spent the entire evening together, eating, drinking, playing cards, and going to bed at one in the morning. Police were still suspicious, and their suspicions grew when they scraped under Gourbin’s nails and found what looked like skin tissue. At the time they were decades away from any biological test which could link the skin cells under Gourbin’s nails to Marie. There was no way to analyze the tissue.
Until a closer look produced a new avenue of evidence. The tissue was covered in powder. The powder included magnesium stearate, a white powder commonly used as a binding agent, zinc oxide, a sunscreen, bismuth, an iridescent mineral used to make glittering powders, and a red iron-oxide. It was face powder. And, according to the chemist in Lyons, he only mixed it for Marie Latelle.
via Gizmodo
