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THE WEEKLY DETAIL
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Breaking NEWz you can UzE... |
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compiled by Jon Stimac |
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Fingerprints on Duct Tape Lead Police to Bandit –
CLEVELAND PLAIN DEALER, OH - May 31, 2007
...Police identified suspect because his fingerprints were on the
inside of the duct tape...
New Era, New Spy Tricks –
SAN JOSE MERCURY NEWS, CA
- May
31,
2007 ...agents can find out within minutes
whether the fingerprint from a newly captured suspect overseas matches
a terrorist database...
Attorneys Say Crime Lab is Substandard
–
TUCSON CITIZEN, AZ
- May
30,
2007 ...the state will ask for construction bids on the new
crime lab in July with groundbreaking scheduled for September...
Dutch Pot Shops to Fingerprint Customers
–
WASHINGTON POST, DC
- May 30, 2007
...fingerprints would be coupled with a digital photograph and a scan
of customers' ID cards... |
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Recent CLPEX Posting Activity |
Last Week's
Board topics
containing new posts
Moderated by Steve Everist |
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Digital Photo Logs
Steve Everist 183 Sun Jun 03, 2007 7:18 pm
McKie's facing court appearance?
Daktari 6047 Sun Jun 03, 2007 9:19 am
IAFIS Hits?
Ann Horsman 581 Sat Jun 02, 2007 7:00 am
Charging the defense for extra photographs and charts?
Cindy Rennie 58 Sat Jun 02, 2007 3:02 am
Exemplars and Inconclusive
Charles Parker 411 Fri Jun 01, 2007 2:41 pm
latent prints in blood
Julie 450 Fri Jun 01, 2007 11:35 am
This Will Brighten Your Day
Ann Horsman 277 Fri Jun 01, 2007 9:01 am
Statistics and Misidentifications - The weeks Detail
Michele Triplett 5377 Wed May 30, 2007 2:01 pm
Point Of View: Point Counters and Pseudoscience
Charles Parker 3901 Wed May 30, 2007 1:15 am
Poor Exemplars and Inconclusives
Charles Parker 8 Tue May 29, 2007 8:37 pm
Poor Exemplars and Inconclusives
Charles Parker 6 Tue May 29, 2007 8:37 pm
Latent Print Examiner Positions - CONUS/OCONUS
wkpetroka 143 Tue May 29, 2007 1:35 pm
A List of Biases
Boyd Baumgartner 174 Mon May 28, 2007 10:41 pm
Mass Mailing - distribution address lists for AFIS
Terry A. Smith 142 Mon May 28, 2007 7:01 pm
(http://clpex.com/phpBB/viewforum.php?f=2)
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UPDATES ON CLPEX.com
Updated the Smiley Files with 5 new Smiley's - thanks to David Johnson,
Smith & Savage, Rich Townsend (2 submissions) and Julie Snyder for their
contributions to the Smiley Files!
_________________________________________
Lenny Butt brought us information about the
recent National Academy of Sciences meeting regarding forensic science
needs.
We monitor an Internet
discussion on the importance of known print quality for conclusive results
from latent print comparisons.
_________________________________________
Recent Discussion on the
Importance of the Quality of Known Fingerprint Standards
by CLPEX.com Forum Conbributors;
(www.clpex.com) "Chat Board"
It is simply amazing to me that the quality of finger and palm print
exemplars is going down the tube. They are a bunch of crud. Here we have
multi-million dollars of computer equipment and the garbage that goes in is
terrible. I am surprised on some of the hits we make.
On a prior thread they talk about the issue of a less than full time
examiner will not make the hard calls and the suspect goes free. How about
this: A latent print from a sexual assault is entered into AFIS and it does
not hit because the exemplar in the data base was not properly taken or
entered. Who are we going to roast on that one?
The CJIS in this country (my part of it) is getting worse. They hire bottom
of the wage people and give them none or next to nothing training and expect
them to be running this equipment in a day. The first thing they are taught
is which button is the quality override button on the machine. They hire
managers who are computer/math gurus or a relative to someone higher on the
food chain who do not know a loop from a whorl (and don’t care to either).
Their concept of quality is to see how fast the systems can churn out the
bytes of information and do not care a twit about what comes in or the
ramifications of what is coming out.
Agencies are hiring people who want to ride in cars going fast and catch bad
guys but find themselves in a very little room taking finger and palm prints
from a bunch of smelly people. They lose all interest in doing a good job.
They want to get away from that smell as fast as they can. Agencies are only
concerned with how fast they can get them through the revolving door.
Agencies have no quality assurance program when it comes to the friction
ridge exemplars.
I was trying to obtain a set of palm prints on an old case and contacted an
agency that a subject had been arrested at years before. I asked them if
they took palm prints and they said yes. I asked for a set and was told that
they only keep them for five years and then destroy them. I asked “WHY” and
was told that they change over that period of time. Who is running that CJIS----Al
Capone.
People (the public) have no idea the poor quality that is coming in. We rant
and rave about bum ID’s (and well we should) but how about the number of bad
guys that are getting away with a crime because the quality exemplars needed
for the machines or a LPE to work at a optimum are not there.
For all the statisticians and math people out there, figure this out: If one
out of five arrests the exemplar cards are below 50% of full friction ridge
capture and if 60% of those arrested are recidivists, and 25% of property
crimes there are latent prints obtained, how many crimes go undetected
because of the poor quality exemplars.
Answer: A BUNCH
For the cognitive psychiatrist that are out there. What is the bias term for
not doing a good job or a department ignoring the problem? If you do not
have one you better get busy and invent one.
For the defense and prosecutors that are out there, you better hope we do
not get this problem fixed because if we do your work will double.
For the SWGFAST people that are out there how about some written STANDARDS
on the quality of friction ridge exemplars. You changed the name of major
case prints you might as well write the standards for what constitutes a
quality set of exemplars.
My solution to this problem is: Every state is to set up a quality board
that oversees the training, education, standards, and quality of every one
responsible for recording friction ridge exemplars. Minimum of 24 hours on
how to take good exemplars, and then a certification test. Re-education
hours required every year with re-certification every 3 years. If your
agency does not have any one certified to obtain friction ridge exemplars
then you pay a hefty fine for everyone that gets out without being printed.
None of this “well let us give it to the non-profit professional
organizations to handle”----BULL. Make it a law and put some teeth into it.
If an agency does not comply then you start taking money from them. I
guarantee you that will wake them up.
Our priorities are messed up. Yes we should be concerned about errors made
by examiners. Yes we should be concerned about examiners not fully trained.
But stop and think how many crimes go undetected due to the poor quality
exemplars that are being taken and entered. You do not hear a peep about
that one, but it occurs every day and with more frequency that bum ID’s or
letting the hard one’s go.
I am terrible sorry if I have offended someone with my TEAR, but when I
pulled my third case and the exemplars are only good for plastering bathroom
walls I got disenchanted with the CJIS system. No other discipline has the
problems with their known exemplars as does the fingerprint group. I am
tired of writing inconclusive reports. I am fortunate that I did not develop
mindset and see something there that was not there.
Perhaps someday we will have 100% proper exemplars to go along with our 100%
non-error rate. I could go on, but I have vented and now I can go back to
work.
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I'm not in the habit of supporting totalitarianism but perhaps we sould
follow the lead of the Ceauşescu regime in Romania.
On a livescan training course our trainer related the following story to us.
He was in Romania in the nineteen-nineties overseeing the impementation of
their new AFIS system. In the middle of talking with a bunch of officers
about the importance of good quality prints he went over to a stack of cards
and started flicking through them.
"What are you looking for?" asked on of the officers.
"A bad set of prints." Mike replied.
"You won't find one. It's illegal in Romania for a police officer to take a
bad set of prints."
According to this officer, back in the days of Ceauşescu someone close to
the president had their house broken into and, although latent prints were
recovered, a search did not identify any suspects.
Some years later a routine reverse search did hit and the burglar was
identified. Guess what - this guy was on the system at the time of the
original search but the prints were sub-standard and the ident was missed.
Well President Ceauşescu wasn't best pleased with this and promptly passed a
law threatening Police officers with a hefty prison sentence if they
submitted sub-statndard prints.
Makes you wonder what the hit rates are like on the new AFIS out there.
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It is interesting to read your posting.
We (South Africa) are experincing the same problem. Our AFIS guru`s have
indicated that by the year 2011 our AFIS system will crash. This is due to
the poor prints clogging up the system.
Currently we are having to try an address a problem which should not be
existing.
It appears there is a lack of interest, and understanding of the importance
of the role of taking prints
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Sadly, your post pretty much sums it up. The success of our work is truly a
team effort, starting with the capture of the exemplar. Most live scans are
very poor and many cards are not correctly entered into AFIS databases
either.
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Good Thread, I wonder how many fingerprint people take the time to:
1) interact with the guys and gals in the print room at the jail?
2) send a screen shot and an "atta boy" on the latent hits made against the
exemplars they are taking.
I realize that this works best at the local level and only when the jail is
part of the same Law enforcement organization, But you have to start
somewhere.
In this area I have found much greater success with positive feedback rather
than threats.
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You are right. I will take a carrot over a stick any day. The agency taking
the exemplars is another agency. We were sending the carrots but like any
agency to agency thing they have to go up a couple of levels and then over
to an equal level and then down to the troops.
Needless to say the carrots got lost in transit somewhere. No one knows
where. No one has seen the carrots. No one cares about the carrots except
those that make them and those who they are supposed to go to.
So if you make carrots and they get lost in transit to the person they are
intended for, after a while you want to quit making carrots.
It is a catch 22. Sometimes you need Admin to help, but sometimes Admin is
busy roasting pork or cutting onions and they do not want to be bothered
with carrots.
One time I wanted to send an atta-boy to someone who really did an
outstanding job. Admin lost it four times.
Rule number 1: Never send anything to Admin without making a copy of it
first.
Rule number 2: Pay close attention to rule number 1.
To be fair and having been in Admin for awhile more stuff is coming from
above than below. Rule number 1 in Admin is that you handle the stuff coming
from above first and then maybe get time to handle stuff from below.
You know what they say: Rocks and stuff roll down hill easier than uphill.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Your points are well taken and certainly vaild (I agree with your first post
in this thread by the way)
I was simply trying to point out that it is no longer "us" and "them" as it
was in the past. I've spent a lifetime complaining about the quality of the
prints I've had to compare and probably even uttered those fateful words "
Why can't those guys do a better job? (I might have even said that about
some of the latents turned in)
I've learned that taking prints is NOT the #1 priority at the jail. It's
care, custody and control.
It's one thing to sell a Live scan terminal with the idea that "you can
reject the prints if they are not good and have them re-taken" but in the
real world it's not gonna happen. I've been told straight away that If I
don't like the prints, I can get my a$$ over to the print room and take them
myself. (gotta give that sergeant credit for honesty)
In any event, we spend ALOT of time sending feedback to the Jail
administration and they do in fact generate an internal memo to the officer
who took prints resulting in a hit. We also support their live scan
equipment and are the first point of contact for them when they have a
problem. When their equipment is changed or upgraded, we do the presentation
and answer questions at their read-off's It's been working out very well but
it sure does take alot of time.
Live scan is an integral part of an AFIS system and "they" are now "us".
Even if you don't supervise the staff in the print room, you can have some
impact if not control
By the way, we also send feed back on the mistakes and the jail
administration generates progressive discipline for the offender.
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You’re not alone in your misery. We had an excellent prisoner processing
unit some years back. The state attributed our AFIS hit rate success to the
excellent quality of ten prints taken by our identification officers. We not
only recorded livescan prints but also recorded a copy of “inked prints” for
our files – yep, you heard me right, old fashion (god I miss them) inked
prints. The bean counters soon moved in and changed our identification
division to a “booking station” and eliminated the retention of the inked
cards nd the livescan card as well. The only thing available for comparison
now is the image retrieved over my remote AFIS system and a hard copy I can
get by mail. They replaced the well trained-dedicated individuals with
employees that had no training and no prior experience. But, hey, they saved
money!
From my point of view I see another very serious problem slowly creeping
into our field.
“AFIS users who are not properly trained Examiners.” The same group of bean
counters and mentally challenged administrators believe that if you have
computer skills, you’re qualified to operate “that AFIS computer.” We need
to address both of these issues and recognize our profession is rolling down
hill like a snowball heading for...
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Well, if you want to broaden the topic, lets talk about prints that are
"good enough" to establish booking identity but are not fully rolled
exemplars needed for latent comparison work. This same problem has existed
for years in getting Palm Prints taken since they are no use to the booking
officer and only used by latent examiners.
An awful lot of live scan users have forgotten or will forget to "roll" the
fingers nail to nail since they can establish booking identity with just the
middle of the pattern. Heck, I've heard there is talk about using the plain
impressions to populate the rest of the fingerprint card for identity checks
since it is so much faster. We need to make the distinction between
biometric identity verification vs latent print identification.
When did fingerprint people stop getting promoted into positions of
authority? Isn't it up to us to educate administrators in an effective way?
We can post here all we want but I don't think the people outside our field
are reading it.
***************************
So how about it? Know anyone who can get this discussion to someone
who needs to read it? Submit it to your regional IAI; Forward it to
the supervisor at the jail; send it to the local Chief's association.
Perhaps reading the frustration within the latent community could make a
difference. Surely it's better than doing nothing.
And yes, I'll stop calling you Surely.
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Until next Monday morning, don't work too hard or too little.
Have a GREAT week!
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