We have covered arson investigation before on this blog:

• Fire Whisperers-the Story of Bad Arson Investigation
• NFPA Releases NFPA 921:2011 and Rejects Negative Corpus
• Discover Magazine features the dangerous side of arson investigation
• Guest Blog Post From Dr. Frederic Whitehurst PhD JD: Forensic Science “Matches”-The Case of Black Powder
• Arson Investigation exonerations

If you have not seen this 60 minutes episode, you should:

Here is the part of the episode that totally shocked me about the arson investigator at the time:

Steve Kroft: How did he determine that it was a young man of color?

Ed Novak: I asked him that.

[Cy Holmes: Blacks at that point, their background was the use of fire for beneficial purposes. In other words, they were used to clearing lands and doing cleanup work and things like that and fire was a tool. So it was just a tool for them. In other words, you’re comfortable with it. And if they get mad at somebody, the first thing they do is use something they’re comfortable with. Fire was one of them.]