The Poisoner’s Handbook: Murder and the Birth of Forensic Medicine in Jazz Age New York

By 1927, Charles Norris had grown increasingly concerned by how Prohibition was affecting New York City’s residents. The law had seemingly had the opposite effect of its intention, with New Yorkers drinking “more recklessly [and] more adventurously” than they had prior to Prohibition (152). With no legal way to procure alcohol, New York’s drinkers went to illegal saloons that used chemical solutions, such as Formula 39b, to remove the toxic methyl alcohol from industrial alcohol. These attempts were never fully successful, however, which meant that drinkers were often consuming drinks laced with toxic methyl alcohol. In response, the US government began ordering corporations to pour even more toxic poisons into their industrial alcohol, with the hopes of deterring illegal drinking.

The medical examiner office saw an increase in the number of deaths caused by poisoned alcohol, and Norris was outraged that the government was knowingly poisoning drinkers. In a public statement, Norris declared that “the United States Government must be charged with the moral responsibility for the deaths that poisoned liquor causes […]” (155). In response, Prohibition advocates claimed that individuals choosing to break the law bore the sole responsibility for their deaths.