Fingerprint Hits Used to Measure CSIs Competency - Fair?

[VijaySharma]

Hi all,

I im looking to see if when a CSI (or a group of CSIs) obtain numerous fingerprint hits from crime scenes to the fingerprint database, does it really mean he/they are more competent than other CSIs, or are fingerprint hits just shear luck? (i.e. if another CSI went to that scene instead he would have got the hit)

Are the number of hits a true measure of a CSIs scene examination competency ?

I have been looking for published papers in this area, i have been unable to locate anything during my searches.

[SConner]

I would not base the competency of a CSI based on the number of hits that their lift cards may generate. There are too many variables at a scene to rely on whether or not one's processing ability or lack thereof generates a hit. Furthermore, the suspect may not even be in the system to get a hit against.

If you want some sort of discriminating ability to grade one CSI against another, maybe look at things like the quality of their lift cards. Does one CSI routinely turn in lift cards with creased/mangled tape? Does one CSI turn in horribly over powdered latent lifts? If they're required to keep a log of what they processed at a scene, is one CSI doing the bare minimum and the other one trying to powder anything and everything that the suspect(s) might have handled?

[ER]

I think it comes down to a carrot/stick argument?

What is the point of tracking AFIS hits? Probably to tell those with lower numbers to do better.

Instead, give meaningful recognition when a CSI's lift generates a hit, or leads to a conviction, or breaks a big case or series of crimes.

Reward the successes instead of trying to punish mediocrity. Rewards result in always striving for more and better. Punishment results in everyone trying to be average but no better.

[Tazman]

In my latent print unit, backlog is always the driving force. Some case submissions sit for years waiting to be processed. Over a 12 month period, the number of cases a top producer in our agency turns out is usually three to four times greater than that of the lowest producing examiner in the unit. The same arguments I read here are used in defense of the low producers. Not all cases are the same. Some examiners are more thorough and careful. Some examiners just have the luck of the draw. I don't buy it.

While it has been years since I was a crime scene examiner, the same basic factors apply. Some crime scene people have developed better intuition at locating surfaces touched by a perp. Some CS techs have perfected their technique at teasing out faint latents or processing difficult surfaces successfully or lighting better for a usable latent print photograph.

In a one month period, the numbers can be drastically uneven. But over a year's interval (the usual rating period), things should average out, more or less. I would submit that some examiners work harder and are better at what they do. But I would also suggest that any place of employment with a number of employees doing the same job will note inequities in productivity. An employer has to accept a bell curve distribution, but below some level on the curve, a decision has to be made that working below that level is unacceptable. That is the employer's right and you have to accept that fact when you take the job. The employer defines that limit, not the employees.

I would suggest that if you are getting disciplined for low numbers, you can complain that life isn't fair, but that won't help you when you are too far down that bell curve. A better approach would be to study and work your butt off to move upward along the curve. Let somebody else be the lowest producer.

[Bill Schade]

Reminds me of the story of two hikers in the woods who come upon a bear and the bear starts chasing them.

While the hikers are running away, one says to the other "you know we can't outrun that bear"
second hiker responds:


"I know, I just have to outrun you"

[SConner]

In my latent print unit, backlog is always the driving force. Some case submissions sit for years waiting to be processed. Over a 12 month period, the number of cases a top producer in our agency turns out is usually three to four times greater than that of the lowest producing examiner in the unit. The same arguments I read here are used in defense of the low producers. Not all cases are the same. Some examiners are more thorough and careful. Some examiners just have the luck of the draw. I don't buy it.

While it has been years since I was a crime scene examiner, the same basic factors apply. Some crime scene people have developed better intuition at locating surfaces touched by a perp. Some CS techs have perfected their technique at teasing out faint latents or processing difficult surfaces successfully or lighting better for a usable latent print photograph.

In a one month period, the numbers can be drastically uneven. But over a year's interval (the usual rating period), things should average out, more or less. I would submit that some examiners work harder and are better at what they do. But I would also suggest that any place of employment with a number of employees doing the same job will note inequities in productivity. An employer has to accept a bell curve distribution, but below some level on the curve, a decision has to be made that working below that level is unacceptable. That is the employer's right and you have to accept that fact when you take the job. The employer defines that limit, not the employees.

I would suggest that if you are getting disciplined for low numbers, you can complain that life isn't fair, but that won't help you when you are too far down that bell curve. A better approach would be to study and work your butt off to move upward along the curve. Let somebody else be the lowest producer.

I agree with most of what you said, however, when I worked crime scenes, I often worked graveyards in the middle of winter. It was very quiet most nights, maybe one or two calls, and I would go days, weeks, or even a month without having to touch my latent print kit because of the nature of calls that I was responding to. Now if you compared my latent print hit total against somebody working the swing/second shift where it was burglary after burglary after burglary then that's not a fair comparison. Furthermore, if you compared the number of calls responded to against somebody working either day or swing shift then that's not a fair comparison either. It would be like trying to ding a dayshift patrol officer working weekdays for not catching as many impaired drivers as a swing or graveyard patrol officer working on the weekends. There will always be people on the left side of the bell curve, sometimes it's because their lazy, sometimes it's just because of the nature of the work.

[Tazman]

Fair enough. In my agency, we have morning shift and evening shift and we rotate monthly. We rotate on-call at nights for one or two per week with each of us having nearly equal numbers over a year's period. I would think in your scenario, any supervisor or manager would certainly not compare the graveyard shift numbers to the morning or evening numbers, but with a large enough group on each shift, they might compare the numbers within a shift. I recognize the inherent potential for unfairness in comparisons of productivity, but at the same time I have worked with slackers who gave all the usual excuses for why their lives were so unfair and how they got picked on. When the larger percentage are out there hustling and a few are out there drifting with the flow and doing as little as possible, a supervisor or manager has an obligation to address the situation.

[josher89]

I agree with ER and have been putting that in to practice for the last several years. I created an AFIS Hit Award a few years ago that I give to our CSIs in the event of an AFIS hit or a side-by-side comparison hit to a victim elim. It started out as a joke of sorts and now they are used to promote excellence in the CSI Unit. the CSI supervisor keeps track of hits each month and they are used for 'bragging rights' among each other. No one gets ostracized for NOT getting an AFIS Award; it's just used to boost morale. I have even sent atta-boys down to our local jail when I get an AFIS hit on a card in the system; I'll look up the jailer that rolled the prints and send their manager an email letting them know that because they took the time to roll a good set of prints, I was able to identify a latent print to that individual. I don't do this every time (I reserve it for the major cases or for a string of burglaries, thefts, or robberies) and they keep track down there as well. So, it's a little thing that I can do to help out other divisions.

To the point, however, fingerprint development or hit ratio shouldn't be used to measure competency. I've worked both sides of the lift card and I know, like others that have responded here, that if your shift is at a certain time or you live in a certain locale, you are getting less property-type crimes and more crimes against people. It's not the fault of the CSI in any way. I would also agree with SConner in that if you need to evaluate a CSI on their competency based ONLY on fingerprint lifts, look at the way the card is filled out, how the tape is placed, if there are subsequent lifts of the same print, etc. Simply not finding latent prints isn't a good way to measure their worthiness.

[George Reis]

This is an interesting question Vijay, and others have pointed out variables that need to be factored in to determine why the hit rate for one CSI may be different for another. But, I want to toss in a few other issues also.

First, the number of calls. Some mentioned that fewer calls may be an issue of what shift someone works, which is true. But it also can be a competence issue. For instance if two or more CSIs are working the same shift and one never answers the phone when a call comes in. I've seen this, and it is a matter of either laziness or something else in which the employee would rather hang around the office than process a scene. I'd argue that this an issue that could be addressed by management of policy.

Number of prints collected. I've seen some people go to scenes and often come back either empty handed, or with very few cards from a big scene. Is this a matter of careful scrutiny of where to collect prints, or laziness? Could be either. Or, the person who always brings back handfuls may be printing surfaces where they know they'll collect prints even if it's highly likely that the suspect never touched the area. Or, they may simply be doing a more thorough job. I knew someone who wasn't very competent at comparisons, so he would ask the victim to touch a surface at the scene and collect those prints and match them to the victim to keep his numbers up! He did it under the guise of showing the victim what he was doing (and he got found out about, which is why I know the story).

Quality of prints. Does the CSI determine print quality in the field and not lift prints that they think of as having no value? Or, do they lift and collect every smudge, smear and mark no matter what? If they collect everything and you are thinking of hits as a percentage of lifts, then this would be something to consider in the factoring.

Who enters the print. This is a skilled process and can be a measure of competency of the AFIS operator rather than the CSI. If the CSI enters their own lifts, then they may be a more competent in one of these skills than the other. Or, if a CSI from one agency has a highly skilled AFIS operator, and the CSI at another agency has a less skilled AFIS operator, they may get different results based on someone else's skill.

Anyway, I think your concept has validity, but there are just a lot of variables that need to be considered.

[Shane Turnidge]

Obviously there are more dimensions that should be used to measure a CSI's competency. Photographic skills, scene sense, note keeping, environmental awareness and court testimony to name a few.
That said, I keep thinking back to something Ron Smith once told me:

"Stats don't hurt people that work but they kill people that don't."

Shane Turnidge

[areitnau]

I would offer another thought, more from the latent print section viewpoint. For me, the amount of quality latents submitted to the lab is what is important. Not everyone is in the system for a "hit" or even an "ID", but if the LPE can examine the impressions that are submitted, and the Crime Scene Personnel can separate the insufficient impressions from those that may be of potential value for further examination, that s a valuable skill to the investigative process.

[ER]

One other point to add in...

I don't have an issue with measuring productivity. However, measuring hits is not the best metric to measure a CSI's productivity. It's just too far down the workflow. It is an easy stat for a supervisor to measure though. I would challenge supervisors to find a better metric if they want to track and compare their employees.