CLPEX Chat Board

Does anyone know if the simultaneous impression from this case are available (or ever will be available) for viewing?

The following was posted on the Boston PD web site and is attributed to the Suffolk Co DA:

“With respect to the Court’s ruling regarding the simultaneous fingerprint impressions in Commonwealth v. Terry Patterson, the district attorney’s office is reviewing the impact of that portion of the Court's decision upon the potential admissibility of the latent fingerprints matched to the defendant on three separate occasions: by the Boston police in 1994, by the Massachusetts State Police in 2004, and by a private fingerprint consulting expert, Ron Smith & Associates, in 2005.

“To the extent that the Court found that the Commonwealth ‘has not yet met its burden of proving the reliability of examinations of simultaneous fingerprint impressions,’ the district attorney’s office is evaluating whether to seek to present additional expert evidence regarding the reliability of simultaneous impressions to the trial judge in order to satisfy that additional burden. As well, we continue to prepare to re-try Terry Patterson and are confident he will again be held accountable for the tragic murder of Boston Police Det. John Mulligan.”

Evidently the DA does not think that this issue has been settled. I doubt that prints will be made available, at least by those involved with the prosecution, until after the trial.

Thanks for the info. I guess the saga continues.

I don't have them. They were not in the packet of materials from the Daubert/Lanigan hearing that I received from defense trial counsel. I don't think they were an exhibit at the hearing, and thus the Supreme Judicial Court didn't see them either. (It would have been the Commonwealth's burden to put them in.)

They should be public documents from the underlying 1st trial, but the exhibits are likely physically in the possession of the District Attorney's Office. One could write to them about it.

On the other hand, the Cowans fingerprint materials should also be public documents as they were used in Cowan's trial, but when last I tried to get copies, I got a major run-around from the Attorney General, Boston PD, and Suffolk DA. The best I was able to get were blurry pictures of the mug the prints were found on and the exemplars. (Ed Germain has a copy of what I got for onin.)

I would love to see IAI formally request both the Cowans and Patterson prints and publish them as teaching tools.