NCJ Number
80105
Journal
Journal of Police Science and Administration Volume: 9 Issue: 3 Dated: (September 1981) Pages: 317-326
Date Published
1981
Length
10 pages
Annotation
This article reviews the historical development of automated fingerprint identification, citing skepticism and technical difficulties of the 1960's as well as recent innovations that have made automated techniques a significant boon to investigative work.
Abstract
The establishment of the Minnesota Automated Fingerprint Identification Network in 1979 illustrates the advantage of automation: the 'hit' rate for every 1,000 latent prints processed in Minnesota increased from 69 under the old manual processing method to 90 under the new system; the number of man-hours expended per identification was decreased from 35 to 10. Among the significant early steps toward this success is the 1924 initiation of the Federal Bureau of Investigation's (FBI) Identification Section and John Fitzmaurice's work in the 1960's with the application of machines to fingerprint reading. The primary problem is and has been the sheer volume of fingerprint records and a question as to their value to criminal justice in the reduction of criminality in comparison to the costs involved. Among the 1960's, efforts that contributed to the evolution of computer matching of fingerprints were programs at the New York Police Department, the FBI, the Great Britain Police Research Services Branch, the New York State Identification and Intelligence System, the Center of Computer Sciences and Technology of the National Bureau of Standards, and research at the McDonnell Douglas Corporation. The latest (1978) addition to automated fingerprinting identification is the PRINTRAK 250S, currently in use by the FBI, and police departments in California, New York, Minnesota, and others. The effectiveness of its use is demonstrated by the Houston Police Department, where a case of murder and attempted rape was solved by feeding the system a fairly legible latent print that was enhanced, scanned, read, and compared against prints in the file in a little over 2 minutes, yielding positive identification of a suspect subsequently convicted. The Houston system currently stores 3 million individual fingerprints with ongoing daily additions; every arrestee's prints are processed through the system for possible matchup with prints from unsolved crimes. Accuracy and timesaving are the system's most important advantages. Footnotes and 31 references are given.