Artist puts a face on crime

by Nikki Tundel, Minnesota Public Radio

Some artists like to focus on birds and flowers. Others prefer classic cityscapes. Marcia Cummings spends her days drawing pictures of rapists and murderers.

St. Paul, Minn. — Marcia Cummings uses art to help solve crime. As the state's only full-time forensic artist, she creates the police sketches that appear in papers and on the TV news.

Reporter Nikki Tundel met up with Cummings to find out what it takes to turn eyewitness descriptions into portraits of criminals.