Law enforcement officers have consistently relied on fingerprint analysis to recognize suspects and solve offenses for more than 10 decades. Investigators utilize fingerprints to connect a perpetrator to a crime site. Personal fingerprint identification document has also been utilizing to sentence, probate, and parole decision-making. Police officers depend on chemical methods to visualize the evidence. However, a lack of proficient analysis of the evidence has resulted in an inaccurate assessment of the proof. Current wrongful conviction and scientific analysis of forensic techniques have enhanced due to thorough analysis to ensure that the results of forensic evidence such as fingerprints are valid, reliable, and accurate. A recent study carried out by the President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST) argues improving science forensic analysis in courtrooms (Daluz, 2018). There should be automatic fingerprint analysis to decrease bias during the interpretations and matching outcomes, especially when fingerprints in the crime scene are unclear.
No two individuals have precisely similar fingerprints. Even identical twins with the same DNA have distinct fingerprints. This differentiation enables fingerprints to be used in various ways, such as background checks, mass disaster recognition, biometric security, and criminal circumstances. Fingerprints remain a significant method for police officers. They have constantly been tracing criminals` records, past arrests, and convention assists in sentencing them. Fingerprints are typically essential in criminal justice realms because crime investigators and assessors link unknown fingerprints gather from the crime scene to known prints of potential suspects, victims, or witnesses to help in a criminal investigation. Most times, killers may leave fingerprints on the murder weapons, or perpetrators leave fingerprints on the victim's body and other numerous occasions. Sometimes, law enforcement officers do not have the DNA of numerous people. Therefore, fingerprints are utilized in the criminal justice process to identify a convicted suspect's identity and track the perpetrators' past life.
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The Function of the Fingerprint Analysis Unit
The Federal Bureaus of Investigation Laboratory is the broadest and comprehensive crime lab across the world. It offers a scientific analysis of evidence for US law enforcement organizations and helps distribute information globally. The FBI is a federal governmental organization under the United States Department of Justice. The FBI crime laboratory consists of 25 units in two main categories. It includes the Operational Support Branch and the Forensic Analysis Branch. The laboratory contains departments such as firearms, fingerprints, questioning records, chemistry analysis, tracing victims, DNA analysis, and explosives. There are also numerous particular departments required in the 21st century.
The fingerprint analysis unit is a special department that deals in latent and patent fingerprint analysis. The fingerprint is often linked with inked fingerprints from suspects or victims at the crime scene. Investigators use an automated fingerprint identification system to evaluate database searches for crime site prints with no available prints. All the fingerprint assessors in the United States access the FBI's Integrated Automated Fingerprint Identification System, the most advanced biometric database globally. The database contains fingerprints and criminal history of about 100 million criminals and approximately 50 million civilian fingerprints (Win et al., 2020). It makes it easy for fingerprint identification.
The Integrated Automated Fingerprint Identification System (IAFIS) is a computerized tool kept by the FBI since 2000. It is a national computerized fingerprint analysis system that allows fingerprint analysts to search prints for criminals and civilians. It also enables analysis to search latent prints, store electronic images, and exchange information regarding fingerprints and responses. The system contains 80,000 known and suspected criminals within the United States and the international law enforcement organization. Hence, identify them because straightforward.
With the assistance of the system, the unit performs background checks, and the results are permanently stored within the database. For example, the State of Washington mandates that all people seeking employment in a healthcare setting with vulnerable children, such as kids with disabilities, physically or emotionally disadvantaged to submit fingerprints and enter them in the database. The main purpose is to perform a background check to determine if such an individual has any criminal behavior.
Additionally, the fingerprint analysis units create awareness among the general public to voluntarily submit their fingerprints to the FBI either through federal, state, or federal law enforcement organizations. When they get fingerprints, these organizations can partake in numerous activities like US-VISIT programs and background evaluation of people. The unit will catalog this information, and in case of any criminal activities, they will connect easily with the subjects.
Type of Forensic Examinations Within the Fingerprint Analysis Unit
Fingerprints can be collected from any solid surface, including a person's body. There are two unique tests found in the unit. It includes patent unit evaluation and latent unit analysis. Patent prints are found in numerous regions, either smooth or materials such as clothes, papers, or wood or even nonporous materials such as metals, glasses, or plastic. On the other hand, latent prints are found at the surface of organic oil and sweat on the skin distributed to other surfaces. Latent prints are found on many surfaces, but they are not readily seen and detected, requiring fingerprint chemical reagent or alternate light tools.
Patent prints are gathered using a simple technique. Mainly fingerprint analyst uses the photography. These surfaces are captured in maximum resolution with a forensic assessment scale in the picture for reference. Examiners can enhance the picture's quality by utilizing a low-angle, alternate light technique, partial reagents, or dye during the capture, but on most occasions, it is unnecessary because the prints are clear.
Gathering evidence for latent prints requires examiners to discover a surface using fingerprint powders such as black magnetic materials, aluminum flakes, or dark granular. If any fingerprints are visible, they are captured and then collected with transparent adhesive tapes. The tape is placed on latent cards to store the fingerprint carefully. Sometimes, fingerprint powders can destroy the evidence and ruin the chance to do other methods that could lead to hidden prints or extra data. Hence, examiners may assess the site with alternate light sources or through the application of superglue before utilizing powders.
Analysis of both forensic examinations follows a similar process. In the criminal justice system, the computerized system found at the federal, state, or local fingerprint database is used to find potential connections. Many systems offer a value that indicates how close the match basing on particular algorithms utilized to perform the search. Fingerprint analysts then evaluate the potential matches and make a final recognition. Fingerprint analysts are either law enforcement officers, technicians, or forensic scientists. All these officials must be subjected to thorough training and must possess requisite skills and experiences to do tasks.
Once the fingerprints have been collected, fingerprint analysts will determine whether sufficient data is present in the sample to be utilized for identification. This includes evaluating class and personal elements for the unknown fingerprint. Class elements are traits that narrow down the information to a group and not a person. There are three categories which include whorls, arches, and loops. Whorls present a circular category of ridge flow and take place about 35% of the time. Archers are the minimal form of fingerprint and occur only 5% of the time. Loops are commonly used and occur about 65% of the time (Sinelnikov & Reich, 2017). This fingerprint pattern contains ridges that enter one region of the fingerprint, circle around, and then exit on a similar region. Personal elements are those traits that are distinct to an individual. They are thin and irregular in shape, which occurs at the friction ridges.
After the evaluation of latent and patent fingerprints, unknown samples are compared with known fingerprints. The unknown samples are those collected at the crime scene, and known prints are possible suspects. The class elements are compared if the two fingerprints are not in consensus, then the first print is automatically eradicated. If they agree, examiners then focus on the personal elements. They check each personal trait element by element until they find a possible match.
Significance of Fingerprints Analysis in Solving Crimes
Fingerprints are part of the investigation process to connect and match people present at the crime scene. One of the theories argues that there are no two similar fingerprints until automated tools are proven incorrect. However, the points utilized on the fingertip may match another individual in the world. The entire print may not be a precise match. The automatic software system utilized to discover potential suspects reveals more than one individual that matches the points. Therefore, this aspect is useful because it decreases fingerprints to less than few individuals and disregards the incidences that could not have been there.
Fingerprints identification is highly accurate because it can never be the same for two people. For instance, in 1978, a 61-year-old Carol Bonnet was murder in his house. Police officers gathered evidence, including fingerprints from his bathroom. Law enforcement officers believed that the perpetrator was trying to clean off the blood and other proof before leaving Bonnet's house. His vehicle was then stolen. The car was found in Illinois, and after gathering extra latent prints, fingerprint analysts develop fresh leads. The crime scene sources were processed, and fingerprints were collected from his apartment, and the vehicle was searched in the local and state fingerprint documents. No matches were found, and the case was put on hold. The re-investigation occurred in 2008 when the Omaha Police unit got an inquiry on the case. The automated software did not exist in 1978, and technician Laura Casey within less than four hours searching the print in the database, found possible suspects for comparison purposes (FBI, 2017). Casey spends the day analyzing the fingerprints and came up with potential identification – Jerry Watson, who was in jail for burglary crimes. Later on, Jewry Watson was found guilty after officers found that he lived a few blocks from Bonnet's car. He was later sentenced to life in prison because the DNA matched with samples collected in the victim's car and bathroom.
Additionally, fingerprint identification is a quick way of identifying suspects. The 2018 Sun reports found that a 12% increase in homicides across the country. There were about 30 murders in New York (Tangen et al.,2020). Along with other crimes, there has been a rise in the significance of fingerprint analysis systems which assist law enforcement officers in finding perpetrators easily. Many suspects fake their IDs but cannot alter their fingerprints. Police officers are currently utilizing biometric scanners even to detect fake fingers. Therefore, solving crimes have become easy than ever before. Law enforcement agencies argue that murder investigations currently take less than one year to find the crime's real perpetrators. Once identified as the important solution for finding suspects, fingerprints will be advanced than ever before. Many people are being requested to install fingerprint identification at their homes and offices to make life easy, comfortable, and secure.
References
Brunelle, E., Huynh, C., Alin, E., Eldridge, M., Le, A. M., Halámková, L., & Halámek, J. (2018). Correction to fingerprint analysis: Moving toward Multiattribute determination via individual markers. Analytical Chemistry , 90 (3), 2401-2401. https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.analchem.8b00039
Daluz, H. M. (2018). Fundamentals of fingerprint analysis . CRC Press.
FBI. (2017). 30-Year-Old murder solved . Federal Bureau of Investigation. https://www.fbi.gov/news/stories/30-year-old-murder-solved
Sinelnikov, A., & Reich, K. (2017). Materials and methods that allow fingerprint analysis and DNA profiling from the same latent evidence. Forensic Science International: Genetics Supplement Series , 6 , e40-e42. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.fsigss.2017.09.010
Tangen, J. M., Kent, K. M., & Searston, R. A. (2020). Collective intelligence in fingerprint analysis. Cognitive Research: Principles and Implications , 5 (1). https://doi.org/10.1186/s41235-020-00223-8
Win, K. N., Li, K., Chen, J., Viger, P. F., & Li, K. (2020). Fingerprint classification and identification algorithms for criminal investigation: A survey. Future Generation Computer Systems , 110 , 758-771. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.future.2019.10.019
