Katherine Biber: In Crime's Archive: The Cultural Afterlife of Evidence
| Published date | 01 September 2019 |
| Date | 01 September 2019 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/jols.12175 |
IN CRIME'S ARCHIVE: THE CULTURAL AFTERLIFE OF EVIDENCE by
KATHERINE BIBER
(London: Routledge, 2018, 207 pp., £115.00)
Critical and socio-l egal scholars have of ten had an uncomfortabl e
relationship with historical archives, those who create them, who keep
them and the canon of historical method. This book provides those
interested in the things that law leaves behind with an exemplary account
of how archival analysis can be re-imagined and reclaimed. It is an
extremely welcome addition to the burgeoning body of work in the social
sciences and humanities that has taken an archival turn. More specifically
it considers the life history of the evidential objects that the legal system
collects in its pursuit of criminal cases. But rather than concentrating on
the form and value of evidence collected as traditional scholarship has
tended to do, this work considers the fate of things with evidential value
after the trial has concluded. While strict rules govern access to, and
interpretation of, evidence during the course of the trial, Biber considers
what happens after the conclusion of proceedings when there are fewer
norms governing the fate of objects. The strength of this book is the
fascinating array of case studies of the afterlife of evidence presented
rather than an overarching argument that binds them all together, if indeed
this is possible. Each of the case studies draw on an apparently eclectic
array of objects such as crime-scene photographs, models of crime scenes,
the maggots from a rotting corpse used to predict the time of death, and
more ephemeral records such as online news. Going beyond official or
state archives it considers the many places in which objects once central to
the trial reappear: museums, private collections, art galleries, and the
twittersphere. Archives are viewed as constantly revised and unstable
resources capable of critical, creative, revisionist, interventionist, specula-
tive, and counter-archival interpretations long after they have lost their
value in the legal system. Biber's meticulous research, funded by an
Australian Research Council grant, draws on interviews, fieldwork, and
observation in pursuit of stories of the ways in which objects collected for
trials take on new life.
Having introduced a theoretical framework for the book in the intro-
duction which interrogates the notions of archives and evidence, the book
then launches into its case studies. Two chapters examine documentary
images which cannot fail to disturb. A primary concern of both chapters is
the insatiable public demand for images of crimes and attempts to reassert
control over collections that are in danger of becoming caught up in a frenzy
of consumption or dark tourism. Chapter one examines a highly distinctive
and memorable closed collection of 130,000 photographs of crime scenes
created by the New South Wales Police from 1910 which has inspired
fashion designers, creative writers, and art historians to produce work that
connects with the archives. Described as `violent, humiliating, distinctive,
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ß2019 The Author. Journal of Law and Society ß2019 Cardiff University Law School
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