Fingerprints rarely make case

By Donna Hales

Fingerprints used to be the most used item to link someone to a crime scene, but DNA is becoming more prevalent as a tool, said fingerprint expert Stan Florence.

An employee of the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation, he’s been in the fingerprinting business for more than two decades.

“It’s very rare that we have a match,” he said.

One reason, he said, is that it’s difficult to pull prints — they almost always have to be on a small, clear surface.

“A more porous surface, possibly like a tire tool, it would be very rare to pull a legible print. And it has to be more than a partial print,” he said.

Florence has seen lots of prints where he could see ridge detail that wasn’t sufficient enough to make a match.

“Over the last 25 years, I personally only had a couple of cases where a print linked a suspect to the scene,” he said.

Today, DNA is used much more than fingerprints in solving crimes, he said.

“There is some research now that apparently is getting skin cells off a shell casing or sweat off a shirt that’s been discarded,” Florence said. “And eyewitness testimony is just as good as a fingerprint.

“Fingerprints are not always the key to solving a case, but something they can use. A lot of times I can pull a good print — a lot of times I can’t.”

Many times there is not enough oil in a person’s skin to leave a good print, he said.

Chemical enhancement helps in pulling a good print, he said. It’s better if the evidence can be taken to a lab where doing that is more readily available, he said.

If there is a print found on a beer can or something like a lamp, it’s good to take the item to the lab instead of trying to pull a print in the field, he said.

OSBI spokeswoman Jessica Brown said getting good fingerprints not only depends a lot on the surface, it takes skill.

“Many police departments don’t take near the number of fingerprints that an OSBI fingerprint expert will over the years,” she said.

Muskogee law enforcement officials say most local law enforcement agencies can’t afford the equipment or the experts to analyze fingerprints on their own.

Even if a computer says a fingerprint is a match, an expert has to verify what the computer says, Brown said.

To make comparisons of unknown latent prints to known fingerprints, a person has to be properly trained and either working for an agency that is accredited by the American Society of Crime Lab Director-Laboratory Accreditation Board (ASCLD/LAB), or the individual would need to be certified by the International Association for Identification (IAI), or be in the process of achieving individual IAI certification, said William Mahoney.

Mahoney, who has worked for the OSBI in the its Latent Evidence Unit for more than six years, said the OSBI is an accredited lab. He is an IAI certified examiner and has analyzed thousands of latent prints and has testified in courts all over Oklahoma.

In the state of Oklahoma, there are approximately seven individuals certified by the IAI (four of them at the OSBI and three at the Oklahoma City Police

Department).

There are currently less than 25 individuals in the state who work in an accredited lab and/or are certified, or in the process of being certified, Mahoney said.

He said the following agencies are ASCLD/LAB accredited: OSBI, Oklahoma City Police Department, Tulsa Police Department, Broken Arrow Police Department, Ardmore Police Department and the Questioned Documents Lab at the Oklahoma County District Attorney’s Office.

State law mandates that to render an opinion in court, a latent print analyst must be from an accredited lab, be IAI certified, or be in the process of being certified by the IAI.



Reach Donna Hales at 918-684-2923 or Click Here to Send Email

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