Fredric Rieders

Fredric Rieders (July 9, 1922 – November 26, 2005) was an internationally renowned forensic toxicologist. He was born in Vienna, Austria. He was most well known for his testimony in the O.J. Simpson murder trial, where he testified that presence of detectable amounts of the preservative EDTA found in blood at the scene indicated that it may not have come from a human being, but possibly was planted. Some of his other well-known cases include the Robert Curley case, in which Curley’s wife, Joann, poisoned him with thallium; another case is that of Michael Swango, or “Dr. Death”—a serial killer who killed as many as 60 of his patients at various hospitals he worked at using succinylcholine and epinephrine.

Rieders received his PhD in Pharmacology-Toxicology from Thomas Jefferson University. He worked as the Chief Toxicologist for the City of Philadelphia for fourteen years. He later founded National Medical Services in Willow Grove, PA in 1970. Now called NMS Labs, it is a private toxicology lab that handles forensic and clinical toxicology. Rieders also created the non-profit Fredric Rieders Family Renaissance Foundation to instill a love of science in the young and disadvantaged. Currently the Foundation is affiliated with Arcadia University's Master of Science in Forensic Science program. Rieders died on November 26, 2005 at the age of 83.