“The Murders in the Rue Morgue”: Forensic Interviewing and Crime Scene Continuity

Abstract

If the forensic Gothic has a register of founding fathers, Edgar Allan Poe unquestionably ranks at the top of the list. Spending his life in incessant physical and emotional pain and being the first American Gothicist to try to earn a living solely by writing—with disastrous personal and financial consequences—the external tormentors in Poe’s life cathartically take the shape of any number of macabre and murderous characters in his poems and short stories. While routinely credited as the inventor of crime fiction and the modern detective story, Poe also laid the groundwork for countless investigative procedures that would come to fruition in the twentieth century once his works gained increased notoriety and appreciation. There is no institutional memory for most of these methods among law enforcement agencies today, the where and when of the origin and history of these procedures often unclear even to those plying them and teaching them. It is clear, however, that Poe foresaw the manner in which evidence, rather than hunches, could and should guide serious and accountable criminal investigations. He also saw the role that language would one day serve both in helping solve mysteries and in professionalizing Anglo-American policing. In doing so, Poe established a formula for not only detective narratives but also forensic narrations that include criminal investigators serving as both documentarians and raconteurs.