C.M. Johnson - Fingerprints

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123

FINGERPRINTING

2 Whodunnit

[Fingerprinting]

All ngerprints are unique and

do not change as a person

ages. This makes them useful

for identifying someone, or

linking them to a crime.

Introduction

Look closely at your nger. You

will see tiny grooves. ese lines

cover our hands and feet. ey

help us grip things. Our ngers

are also covered with sweat

glands. Sweat clings to these lines

like ink, causing us to leave traces

of ourselves wherever we go. Since

no two ngerprints are the same,

those traces are like signatures.

China was ahead of most of the rest

of the world when it came to this

discovery. As early as 700, people

in China used ngerprints as signatures.

Europe and South America caught up in

the mid-1800s.

When studying crimes, police use the

theory of transfer . When two objects

meet, some trace of that meeting can be

found. at trace might be a ngerprint.

Once it is found, this trace can be

read. It might tell us when something

happened. It can clue us into a chain of

events. Most of all, police hope it can tell

them who was there at the scene of the crime.

DID YOU KNOW?

In Argentina in 1891,

Juan Vucetich created the

first fingerprint ID system

for use in fighting crime.

Forensics

transfer: to pass from

one person, place, or

thing to another

People in ancient Babylon, a city

in the area of modern-day Iraq,

signed contracts with their

ngerprints about 4,000 years ago.

FINGERPRINTING

Forensics in Action

In the early 1900s, the people of London

were afraid. Several recent murders had

gone unsolved. e London police had

even failed to catch the terrible Jack the

Ripper. In 1902, when two shopkeepers

were beaten to death, police felt the

pressure to nd this killer. e publics

faith in them was at stake. But the police

had nothing to go on to solve this new

crime. en an ocer saw an oval

smudge on a cash box. He gave it to

Charles Collins.

DID YOU KNOW?

In notes that were printed

in London newspapers,

"Jack the Ripper" made

fun of the police for

failing to catch him.

4 Whodunnit

serial killer: someone

who murders three or

more people over a

period of time, with breaks

between the killings

In the late 1800s, a famous serial killer

named Jack the Ripper killed at least ve

women in the Whitechapel area of London.

Collins was in Scotland Yard s ngerprint division. e division was

only one year old. Collins was eager to try out his new system. He felt let

down when the ngerprint did not match any others he had on le. But

when brothers Alfred and Albert Stratton became suspects, Collins found

a match. e cash box print had been made by Alfreds thumb. In 1905,

the case went to trial. e police were nervous. e public did not know

very much about ngerprints. Just a few months before, prints had been

used for the rst time to convict a person in an English

court. But he was a petty thief. Would a jury nd

two men guilty of murder based on a smudge?

Would they go free? Would the Yard get blasted

for messing up another case? On May 23, 1905,

the jury gave a thumbs-up to the new technology.

e men were found guilty and hanged.

Forensics

Scotland Yard: the

headquarters of the

London police force

petty: small or not

very important

To make a print visible on a hard surface

like a metal cash box, police use a soft

brush to dust powder over the area.

FINGERPRINTING

ad

In China, fingerprints are

used to identify documents

and clay sculptures.

1684

In England, Dr. Nehemiah

Grew writes about his work

using one of the first

microscopes to spot the ridge

patterns on fingertips.

1823

In Poland, professor Jan

Evangelista Purkyne notes

that fingerprint patterns

fall into several types.

1880

In a letter to the journal

Nature

,

Scottish missionary Henry

Faulds urges Scotland Yard to use

fingerprints to tag criminals.

1892

In Argentina, police

use fingerprints to

get a confession out

of a mother who killed

her two children.

News of the case does

not reach Europe for

many years.

6 Whodunnit

History of Forensics

Even aer ngerprints were discovered, hundreds of years passed

before it was well-known that they could be used in ghting crime.

1980 - 1985

The Japanese National

Police Agency

creates the world's

first computerized

fingerprint database.

1897

In India, Azizul Haque

invents an effective way

to classify fingerprints.

This makes them a good

tool for the police.

1904

The United States Bureau

of Identification creates

a fingerprint database.

1911

Thomas Jennings is

the first American

convicted of murder in

the United States based

on fingerprint evidence.

2011

The FBI replaces its fingerprint

computer with Advanced

Fingerprint Identification

Technology (AFIT). The new

system improves matching

accuracy from 92% to 99.6%.

Forensics

FINGERPRINTING

Crime and Fingerprinting

Even aer it was discovered that ngerprints are unique marks, it

would take a long time before they could be used as a standard tool for

solving crimes. Fingerprints fall into three

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