In this episode of Dave Does History, we uncover the dark, forgotten side of Sir Isaac Newton, the man who defined the laws of motion and gravity but also brought those same laws crashing down on London’s criminal underworld.

When England’s economy teetered on collapse in the 1690s, the Crown turned to Newton, not as a scientist, but as a weapon. As Warden of the Royal Mint, he traded telescopes for testimony, equations for evidence, and used his brilliance to hunt counterfeiters in a city drowning in fraud.

His greatest adversary was William Chaloner, a master criminal bold enough to challenge Newton himself. What followed was a battle of intellect and will that ended at the gallows.

This is the story of Isaac Newton’s war on crime, where the man who measured the heavens proved equally capable of measuring guilt—and enforcing justice.