Assignment
Qualifying Questions
1. State your name and occupation.
2. How long have you been with the agency?
3. Where is your present duty assignment location?
4. How long have you been in the Latent Print Unit?
5. What are your duties?
6. What training and experience have you had in preparation for this work?
7. What is your educational background?
8. What professional organizations do you belong to?
9. Have you in the past had occasion to compare latent fingerprints or palm prints with known fingerprints? If so how many examinations?
Once qualified as an expert...
1. What is friction ridge skin?
2. What is a latent print?
3. What is a known print?
4. What are the characteristics you look for in fingerprint identification? (Please explain all levels of detail, level 1, level 2, level 3)
5. What procedure do you use to compare latent prints to known prints?
6. What are the basic principals that underlie the field of latent print comparisons?
7. Can you please discuss distortion and its effect on latent prints.
8. I show you state's exhibit ___ and ask if you if you had an occasion to examine it? When? Where? (Latent Lift)
9. I show you state's exhibit ___ and ask if you if you had an occasion to examine it? When? Where? (rolled inked impressions of defendant)
10. For what purpose did you examine state's exhibit ___ and ____?
11. Please state your conclusion as a result of the examination and show the courts any charts or enlargements you have to visually aid them.
Defense
1. What does ‘of value' mean?
2. What does sufficient mean?
3. So you're saying that it's a completely subjective decision?
4. So someone with more experience might keep something as ‘of value' that you would not?
5. How is this objective when two different examiners, are coming to conflicting conclusions?
6. So isn't it true that latent print identification is only as good as the examiner performing the comparison?
7. Is there a minimum number of points needed to make an identification?
8. So there are no standards within the field?
9. Isn't it true that other countries have a minimum standard?
10. So there are discrepancies in the field?
11. Would you identify a print with 6 characteristics?
12. So how much is enough?
13. When you are making a decision during the evaluation stage, what are your options?
14. Is there a difference between individualization and identification?
15. Has the underlying premise of uniqueness been tested?
16. So it hasn't been proven?
17. Are you a scientist?
18. What is science?
19. What is the difference between classification and identification?
20. What are fingerprint patterns?
21. Of all the pattern types which is the most common?
22. Does my client have this common pattern type?
23. When are friction ridges formed?
24. And how do they form?
25. You mentioned sweat covers the ridges, how does it get there?
26. What is sweat?
27. Are there different types of sweat?
28. Have you ever heard the term nonsecretor? What does it mean?
29. So someone could have touched the item in question and not left a print? Please explain.
30. How long can a latent remain on a surface?
31. So you have no way of determining when my client's print was left on the item?
32. Can a latent print transfer itself from one object to another? If so How?
33. You simply received a latent lift?
34. What is a latent lift?
35. Did you personally record the fingerprints of my client?
36. Then you cannot for a fact say that these are his prints?
37. Have you ever made a mistake?
38. How do we know you did not make a mistake in this case?
39. Are you familiar with ‘Daubert'?
40. Has the ACE-V methodology been tested, validated?
41. Are you familiar with the Mayfield fiasco?
42. If 3 FBI experts can be wrong, can't you?
43. But aren't both latent print identifications?
44. So would the Mayfield error have been caught if the Spanish National Police had not been involved?
45. How many ‘points' might you find in a complete fingerprint?
46. And how many ‘points' did you find in this latent?
47. Isn't that a very small number compared to what could be present?
48. While fully rolled fingerprints might be unique, what about latent prints, are they unique?
49. Are there any validation studies as to the uniqueness of latent prints?
50. How reliable is the transfer of information from the 3D surface of the finger to a 2D impression?
51. What's the difference between verification and blind verification?
52. Is there bias in the field? Explain.
53. Are you familiar with the decision in the Rose case? Please Explain.
54. If you are using the scientific method in your work, what are the appropriate hypotheses?
55. Can you define distortion?
56. Dissimilarity?
57. Is that the same as a difference?
58. How many differences have to occur in a print for it to be an exclusion?
59. So if you can explain a difference away you call it a distortion?
60. How do we know you don't take a difference and explain it away to make an identification?
61. Are you familiar with the NAS report?
62. Now in reference to your latents, you marked things you perceived as matching, correct? Can you point out some differences?
63. There are no differences, but right here, these don't look the same.
64. So you're saying the differences don't matter?
Format your assignment according to the following formatting requirements:
1. The answer should be typed, double spaced, using Times New Roman font (size 12), with one-inch margins on all sides.
2. The response also includes a cover page containing the title of the assignment, the student's name, the course title, and the date. The cover page is not included in the required page length.
3. Also include a reference page. The Citations and references should follow APA format. The reference page is not included in the required page length.