"Flyspray" and concealing prints

[Charles Parker]

Several years ago we were having a run of burglaries and thefts of coin machines that were driving the Detective crazy. After breaking into the machines they were spraying them with WD-40 or in some cases it appeared they were using 30 weight motor oil.

The CS personnel here started conducing experiments on glass, metal, and plastics by placing latent prints on these items, spraying them with WD-40 and or placing them in 30-weight oil. They started using detergents to rinse the items off to see if they could retrieve any latent prints. When that did not work they went to the solvents, starting with Acetone, then Methanol. Those did not work. Then they tried Petroleum Ether and I was very surprised at the results they were able to obtain.

An article was written and published in the Texas Division IAI newsletter. It needs some valadation by other groups, but I think it is a good lead in the right direction.

I believe I have the article available.

Charles Parker

You do not know until you try.