History Main / AbsenceOfEvidence

* In "[[Recap/MonkS1E8MrMonkAndTheMarathonMan Mr. Monk and the Marathon Man]]", after a woman has fallen from her apartment's balcony, Monk walks up to her body and immediately calls it murder; she was interrupted in the midst of painting her toenails, as only seven and a half are finished. The medical examiner later confirms that she was strangled before her body fell.

** In one episode, automated door records, witness testimony, video footage, and the coroner's report all indicate that an out of shape scientist climbed alone up the side of a volcano at night to monitor some anomalous seismic readings, had a heart attack and died. Humphrey looks at the scene for a minute and asks why he didn't have a flashlight...
** In the 2021 Christmas special, DI Nevill Parker has his EurekaMoment when he realises that the murder victim's apparent suicide recording has no sounds of the sea when he allegedly killed himself on the beach.

** The titular detective's very first case as a detective was an example of this;

* In ''VideoGame/Persona4'', [[spoiler: this is one of the things that points to the killer. The killer managed to push the first two victims into the deadly TV world, yet nobody saw anyone suspicious approach them, nor was there any evidence found during the excruciating police investigations afterwards. Similarly, the killer dropped off two threat letters at the home of TheHero, yet nobody suspicious was seen approaching your home. Thus, the evidence points to somebody BeneathSuspicion, someone who would have valid reason to approach the two victims, dispose of any evidence that leads back to him, and whom could go to your home without looking out of place. This narrows the suspects down to, of all people, [[BumblingSidekick Adachi]].]]

* ''Literature/TheMerchantPrincesSeries'': In ''Invisible Sun'', the US Department of Homeland Security know a Person of Interest escaped a safehouse they raided in Berlin. They know she has a cloned burner cellphone, but there were ''lots'' of cellphones in the area, and the German authorities won't let them do more than passive surveilance. So their pan is to keep monitoring cellphone pings on the same tower and, given that she's not an idiot, assume that everybody that returns to the area ''isn't'' her, until they've ruled out all but one.

* In the ''Literature/MerchantPrinces'' novel ''Invisible Sun'', the US Department of Homeland Security know a Person of Interest escaped a safehouse they raided in Berlin. They know she has a cloned burner cellphone, but there were ''lots'' of cellphones in the area, and the German authorities won't let them do more than passive surveilance. So their pan is to keep monitoring cellphone pings on the same tower and, given that she's not an idiot, assume that everybody that returns to the area ''isn't'' her, until they've ruled out all but one.

*** The entire mystery revolves around the lack of a murder weapon found at the scene. Everybody agrees that only Gladia Delmarre, the wife of the victim, could possibly have gotten close enough to kill him, but there was no murder weapon discovered with her and she had no time to remove it from the area or destroy it. This conundrum is what spurs Solaria to ask for outside help. [[spoiler:The murder weapon was the arm of the robot that was found at the scene, which was detachable and could be used as a club. Since everybody took for granted that the robot would not have been involved in the murder, nobody thought to inspect it for physical evidence on its body.]]
*** Baley finds it frustrating that the nature of the robotic society on Solaria prevents the retention of any evidence. The robots are constantly performing routine cleaning, maintenance, and upkeep of the environment so all evidence is destroyed in the course of their normal duties. Despite the numerous attempted murders after Baley begins his investigation, he only manages to retain any evidence of the one he was personally the target of.

* ''Franchise/StarWarsLegends'': ''Literature/NewJediOrder'': The Yuuzhan Vong exist outside the Force, and cannot be sensed or affected through it in any way. However, sufficiently sensitive Jedi can sometimes detect the Vong as a hole in the flow of the Force.

** In the serial killer case documented in the ShowWithinAShow in "[[Recap/MonkS7E7MrMonksHundredthCase Mr. Monk's 100th Case]]", this is shown when Monk is at one crime scene, and later turns out to be a clue that allows them to tie the victim to a serial killer:

** "Mr. Monk Goes to a Fashion Show": Monk proves that a fashion model's apparent suicide by sleeping pills was staged because the victim was wearing lipstick and there are no lipstick traces on the glass she supposedly drank from, meaning that the killer wiped the glass down then put it back in her hand.
** In "Mr. Monk Goes to a Rock Concert", the clue that suggests to Monk and Natalie that a roadie did ''not'' die of an overdose in a port-a-potty is a lack of mud on his boots that would have been present if he'd walked through the muddy patch around the bathrooms.
** In two episodes, "Mr. Monk and the Astronaut" and "Happy Birthday, Mr. Monk", Stottlemeyer concludes that someone else has been to a victim's place of residence from the fact that a computer is missing.
** In the serial killer case documented in the ShowWithinAShow in "Mr. Monk's 100th Case", this is shown when Monk is at one crime scene, and later turns out to be a clue that allows them to tie the victim to a serial killer:

** In another case, the team proves that a Navy K-9 handler has replaced her drug-sniffing dog with an attack-trained dog by the fact that the dog does not alert to the small bag of cocaine that [=McGee=] has in his coat pocket.

* ''Fanfic/ChildrenOfRemnant'': When Pyrrha and Emerald have a fight that demonstrates just how powerful they both truly are, the Vale and Atlas forces meet to discuss it. The entire time, Summer and Qrow are terrified for how Winter will react, as she is easily the most hostile towards the Claimed children. After the meeting ends, they note that she had the worst reaction - she had ''no reaction'' at all, which can only mean that she was already planning something before she walked in.

* In ''Literature/TheSilenceOfTheLambs'', when Lecter gives his fake profile for 'Billy Rubbin', the alleged real identity of serial killer "Buffalo Bill", and can only remember that he had elephant ivory anthrax, Clarice knows that this information is fake because Lecter would never come away with so little information about someone he'd met directly. With this insight, Clarice correctly deduces that Lecter only knew of the real "Buffalo Bill" through second-hand information, allowing her to prompt him to give her another few vital clues.

** "Literature/{{Evidence}}": Someone arrives at U.S. Robotics claiming that mayoral candidate [[AmbiguousRobots Stephen Byerley is a robot]] because he ''never'' eats or sleeps. {{Subverted|Trope}} when Byerley points out that even if said someone spied on him, all they know is that he wasn't eating or sleeping then.

* To evade police after killing President Kennedy and Officer Tippit, Lee Harvey Oswald feigned window shopping - while genuine shoppers paused to observe a passing patrol car with a screaming siren. This prompted the suspicion of the store manager and ultimately led to arrest of Oswald at the neighbouring Texas Theatre.

* ''Series/Daredevil2015'': In the season 1 finale, Matt, Karen and Foggy determine where Leland Owlsley has hidden a corrupt detective who could expose Wilson Fisk, by poring through records dug up by Foggy's ex-girlfriend Marci and noting a specific property that Owlsley has delisted without any record of the property being sold.

** This was, oddly enough, used to discover Superman's secret identity back in the Silver Age of comics. Superman has since started filling his bathroom with all the things needed for daily life, and putting medicines in his locker.

* In ''Film/TheBourneUltimatum'' when the CIA is looking for whoever leaked Blackbriar to the media, their initial response is to check for whoever's cell phone was in the same location as the meeting place. Pamela Landy notes that what they should be doing is checking who has their cell phones turned off, as no employee of the CIA would be stupid enough to meet a journalist with their phone on but that it would be odd for a ranking officer to be out of contact for that long.

** Though this was RightForTheWrongReasons, as the dearth of nuclear fission papers was the result of American scientists agreeing to not publish any papers that might give Nazi Germany the bomb.

* In ''{{Anime/Monster}}'', Johan's crime scenes are "devoid of feeling" -- the kills are executed as coldly and methodically as household chores. In one arc, this enables Runge to determine that a certain murder was [[CopycatCrime committed by a copy-cat]] and not Johan -- [[spoiler:blood spatter clearly shows a man had been [[http://kissmanga.com/Manga/Monster/Monster-40?id=7370#10 slouched in front of a mirror]], but his body is found several feet away because the killer hesitated upon [[http://kissmanga.com/Manga/Monster/Monster-41?id=7374#11 seeing himself in said mirror]]. Johan would have killed the man without a second thought, but the real killer -- the man's nephew -- was shocked to see himself in the process of killing]].

** In ''Eternity in Promise'', Adora muses that, logically, there should have been ''some'' First Ones that didn't manage to get off of Etheria before Mara sent it to Despondos, from Mara's own rebel forces to the soldiers and guards loyal to the First One leaders to the technicians keeping everything running. Yet there's been ''no'' sign of them anywhere on the planet. Not to mention how that, despite the fact that her existence would indicate that there's at least two other First Ones (her parents) out there, she, Entrapta, and Catra are unable to find any sign of them, or even any of their remains at the remains of the sites Horde Prime attacked, despite the sites having plenty of deactived Horde robots and the remains of clones.