Final technical report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. NIJ Award Number: 2010-DN-BX-K232. Ficheiro de 2,41 MB em formato PDF (57 p.).

Executive summary. Purpose. Research design. Findings and conclusions. Data analysis. Implications for policy and practice. Main body. I. Introduction. I.1. Statement of the problem. I.2. Literature review. I.2.1. Nonporous substrates: Metals, handles of weapons (plastics & wood), adhesive tapes. I.2.2. Porous substrates. I.2.3. Environmental stress and ageing. I.2.4. Partial bloody prints. I.2.5. CTF technology. I.2.6. Pitfalls. I.3. Statement of hypothesis or rationale for the research. II. Methods. II.1. General overview and research design. II.2. Initial comprehensive study. II.2.1. Forensically relevant substrates. II.2.2. Fingerprint collection procedure. II.2.3. Evaporant materials. II.2.4. Optimization of CTF development. II.2.5. Selected traditional development techniques. II.2.6. Imaging of fingerprints. II.2.7. Subjective grading of fingerprints. II.3. Depleted fingerprint series. II.4. Partial bloody fingerprints. II.5. Discharged cartridge casings. II.6. Fluorescent evaporant materials. II.7. Preliminary comparison of CTF technique with VMD. II.8. Objective fingerprint grading system. III. Results. III.1. Statement of results. III.1.1. Initial comprehensive study. III.1.1.1. Phase I: Optimization of CTF development. III.1.1.2. Phase II: Comparison with selected traditional development techniques. III.1.2. Depleted fingerprint series. III.1.3. Partial bloody fingerprints. III.1.4. Discharged cartridge casings. III.1.5. Fluorescent evaporant materials. III.1.6. Objective fingerprint grading system. III.1.7. Preliminary comparison of CTF technique with VMD. III.2. Tables. III.3. Figures. IV. Conclusions. IV.1. Discussion of findings. IV.2. Implication for policy and practice. IV.3. Implication for future research. V. References. VI. Dissemination of research findings.