Evgenii Burinskii

Born Feb. 6, 1849, in Riazan’; died Mar. 18, 1912, in St. Petersburg. Russian scholar and criminologist; author of the first original works on criminology and forensic examination in Russia.

Burinskii founded in 1889 the first specialized criminological institution in Russia—the St. Petersburg State Forensic-Photographic Laboratory. In 1898 he received the M. V. Lomonosov Prize for the disclosure of texts on decayed parchment documents by means of scientific methods of photography which he elaborated. The texts, dating from the 14th century, were uncovered during construction work in the Moscow Kremlin. Burinskii is the founder of forensic photography. He knew such methods of criminal investigation of documents as color separation and superposition of negatives, used in contemporary practice of criminal investigation and examination. Burinskii was the author of many scientific works on criminology, including A Note on the Improvements Achieved in Photography (1896) and Forensic Examination of Documents (1903).