NCJ Number
213435
Journal
Journal of Forensic Identification Volume: 56 Issue: 2 Dated: April 2006 Pages: 179-185
Date Published
April 2006
Length
7 pages
Annotation
This article reports on an experiment that examined whether medical examination gloves commonly used at crime scenes may contaminate evidence.
Abstract
Vinyl gloves showed no signs of transference of palm secretions through the glove, because gloves that had not been contaminated on the outside with skin secretions could not leave friction ridge impressions; however, when the outside surface of the glove became contaminated with a transference material, the glove membrane was sufficiently thin and of a density that allowed the glove to transfer the friction ridge shapes to the substrate. Thus, although the glove may provide adequate protection for the wearer from chemical or biological hazards, they do not protect the crime scene from friction ridge contamination. Either a double glove should be worn, or cotton gloves should be worn underneath the vinyl glove shell. For the experiment, which was conducted in July 2004, 28 criminal-forensic-studies students were divided into 4 groups of 7 each. Each group wore one of four types of popular examination gloves that are used by local crime-scene units in South Florida. The authors, wearing cotton gloves, placed a single glove on the right hand of each participant, and then a paper bag was placed over the gloved hand, so as to prevent the individual from contaminating the outside surface of the glove during the experiment. The gloves were worn continuously for 1 hour, after which the paper bags were removed; and without touching anything else, the individuals attempted to create fingerprints by pressing their finger onto new white fingerprint lift cards. The attempts to create latent prints continued every 15 minutes thereafter for 2 hours. 1 table and 6 references