Quality of prints for proof of priors

[Shari]

Quality of prints for proof of priors has deteriorated. The deterioration seems due to digital scanning of the court documents. Our agency currently makes an assessment on a print by print basis to determine the suitability for comparison.

Do agencies have policies or procedures that define acceptable or unacceptable qualities that may be present in these documents (pixelation, half-tone)?

Are there any statutory or other standards for record keeping of fingerprints on court documents for proof of priors?

Has anyone had success trying to implement change on the court level?

Any insights would be helpful. Thanks, Shari

[Bill Schade]

Our clerks office has used microfilm in the past and the quality of the printed copy for later use was routinely terrible. We have even had to do the comparison off of the microfilm reader screen in cases that were important enough. The microfilm image was usually acceptable, it was the printout that had problems.
The clerk has recently implemented a scanned document system for these records and they consulted with us to ensure adequate quality of the fingerprints that were part of the record. I think we are very lucky to have that type of respect from them. I actually signed off on the process they put in place before it was implemented.
The issue of "quality" is a big one and it is more than just the fingerprints that have to be considered. The court record can be many pages with only one of those pages containing fingerprints. To scan at 500 DPI would make the whole system un-workable so I had to be reasonable about our "requirements" (maybe that's why they included us in the process) I think we found a very workable solution here in Pinellas County, Florida.
Of course, we haven't even begun to discuss the quality of the original impressions captured in the courtroom! Have you ever been present and watched that done?
I have had to use the joints of the plain impressions on occasion due to poor quality of the rolled impressions taken in court and other prints have been useless for comparison.
Regarding SOP's or "standards" I think that rests with the courts and if the prints cannot be used, so be it. You can't make chicken soup out of chicken s*%t.

[Pat A. Wertheim]

I had to do a prior on a serial baby rapist that really needed to get put away. The problem, as Shari points out, is that low resolution scans make that darn near impossible. For most cases, I would have blown it off, but not with this old man who was in his 70's and had been doing all the little girls in the family for decades. The County Clerk found some 30 year old originals in archives and with a great deal of work using those old originals from archives, I was able to make an identification on one prior. The old man copped a plea.

The problem was that newer conviction documents are scanned and, I guess, shredded. They don't put them in archives anymore. I tried to talk to the clerk about the quality of the scans and printouts they send us now. But maximum storage at minimum cost was more important than clear detail, so they were more interested in low resolution than in quality. As long as they can read the printing, nobody seems to care whether I can read the fingerprints. We now require the priors documents be submitted to the lab with current inked prints of the defendant well in advance of trial. If the prints on the priors are no good, we don't waste a lot of time. We simply write a "no value" report and move on. Maybe when the County Attorney loses a high profile case somebody will care. We banged our heads against that wall for years and finally gave up.

[Shari]

Thank you for your insights Bill.

I haven't been present when the fingerprints were taken, but we used to go over to the courts and do the comparisons off of the court documents (pre-ASCLD).