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Bernd Brinkmann (born 7 April 1939) is a German forensic pathologist.
Biography
Bernd Brinkmann was the director of the Institute of Legal Medicine of the University of Münster in Münster, North Rhine-Westphalia in Germany from 1981 until 2007. From 1990 until 2009 he served as the Coordinating Editor of the International Journal of Legal Medicine.
Brinkmann became a member of the German Academy of Sciences Leopoldina in 1991 and was president of the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Rechtsmedizin (DGRM) (1995–2001), the International Academy of Legal Medicine (1994–2000) and the International Society for Forensic Genetics (1990–1994).
He is director of the GEDNAP proficiency testing program for quality assurance in forensic DNA profiling and founded the Institute of Forensic Genetics in 2007 which performs forensic DNA analyses for various law enforcement agencies as well as paternity tests for German courts.
Notable cases
In 1997, with Luigi Capasso and Annunziata Lopez, at the request of Otello Lupacchini GIP in Rome, Brinkmann researched the circumstances of the death of Roberto Calvi. Calvi, nicknamed "God's banker", was found hanged in London beneath Blackfriars Bridge in 1982 following the scandal concerning the collapse of Banco Ambrosiano and the involvement of the Vatican Bank. Calvi was said to have committed suicide but tests performed by Brinkmann proved that Calvi wouldn't have been able to hang himself this way and that he was thus actually murdered. Brinkmann's findings lead to a new investigation into Calvi's death and a murder trial in Italy in 2005.
In 2000, Brinkmann together with Jean-Jacques Cassiman used DNA testing to prove that Louis XVII of France who died in captivity as a 10-year-old was indeed the son of Louis XVI of France and Marie Antoinette.
In 2004, Brinkmann - as an expert on Sudden Infant Death Syndrome - was called as an expert witness in a lengthy trial against a man accused of killing his own daughter and his testimony was crucial in proving that the death was of natural causes.
In 2010, Brinkmann was named as an expert witness in the trial of Jörg Kachelmann by the defense but was rejected by the court as biased.