Hans Gross

Hans Gross (1847 to 1915) was an Austrian criminal jurist and criminologist, called the founding father of criminal profiling. Born in Graz, he graduated as a jurist from the university of his home town in 1870 and served as Examining Justice of Styria, acting as judge and prosecutor for the crimes brought before him. The shortcomings he saw in that system of investigation, which leaned on the personal knowledge of magistrates and on limited facts or evidence, led him into criminal science. He taught as professor at Chernivtsi University from 1897 to 1902, at Prague University from 1902 to 1905 and at the University of Graz from 1905 to 1915, and in 1898 he established the Institute of Criminology of Graz. His 1893 handbook for examining judges, Criminal Investigations, a Practical Textbook, introduced the concept of criminalistics and urged the objective use of evidence, including crime scene photography, fingerprints, microscopy and X-rays, together with a neutral judge.