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What Makes A Fingerprint Analyst So Crucial In An Investigation?

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Nikoui And Associates
What Makes A Fingerprint Analyst So Crucial In An Investigation?

There's no denying of the fact that fingerprints have been the gold standard for personal identification in the world of forensic for hundreds of years. Almost all major criminal cases and accidents require a court qualified fingerprint analyst.

Fingerprints are commonly used means to understand the individuality of a person so as to reveal his or her identity. No crime in this world can be pulled off without the aid or assistance of the hands. Fingerprints are of permanent nature and remain the same throughout an individual's life.

 

Fingerprints: Expressed in Words


It is a fact that fingerprints are of universal nature, which means all individuals carry this as a medium of identification. A criminal uses his hands in committing any crime and leaves marks on the scene of occurrence or on any object that comes in contact with his hands while committing the crime.

Crime scene investigators usually gather these prints by physically lifting them with fingerprint powder and sticky tape. But times have changed; now, with the availability of new and improved technology, investigators take digital scans of fingerprints that are just too fragile to lift.

 

The Identification


You must realize that not every crime scene has DNA evidence that is useful for defending a case or prosecuting. Since fingerprints are one of the most important factors in crime-solving, they could be the only means of verifying the people who were at a crime scene or who are involved in a crime. You see, in some cases, investigators or certified latent print examiner may use fingerprints to identify criminals along with verifying their victims and possibly missing persons.


While fingerprints are useful in so many ways, they may not prove with 100% certainty that someone committed an offense. Let just take up an example, if an investigator finds a man's fingerprint on a wine glass next to a dead man in a hotel room, this simply indicates that someone was in the room, and it does not prove that someone took that man's life. However, fingerprints greatly reduce the number of suspects that officials may need to consider.

Now, as far as the timeline is concerned, some fingerprints deteriorate over time as the environment wears them away. The state of fingerprints may give the investigators a clue as to when exactly the crime occurred.

 

Final Thoughts

Solving a criminal case is not at all easy and could become complicated over time. In such cases, it's better to rely on a court qualified fingerprint analyst. These are qualified people to make the jobs easier for investigators and crime scene officials. 


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