In 1910 Edmond Locard established the world's first crime lab, the Laboratoire Intérregional de Police, in Lyon, France, with only two instruments: a microscope and a spectroscope. In the century since, scientific developments have made possible the modern crime lab, which includes among its many tools ballistics identification, chromatography, DNA identification, the electron scanning microscope, and neutron activation analysis. The crime lab plays a crucial role in law enforcement, not only helping police identify and locate criminals but also in the courtroom, where accurate, convincing scientific evidence can help determine guilt or innocence. Crime Lab documents the work performed by crime lab personnel and how their efforts aid criminal investigations.

Modern law enforcement agencies fight crime on many levels, from the street to the boardroom to cyberspace. In many ways the history of modern civilization is the history of crime and the battle against it. As society and technology have become more complex and connected, so have criminal enterprises and the police organizations that oppose them. Each book in the Law Enforcement Agencies series traces the evolution of a specific police force or unit from its inception to the present. The series explores the full range of crime fighting tactics in use today, from the cop on the beat to high-tech surveillance and computer forensics.