CLPEX Chat Board

Perhaps I am getting too old and set in my ways to appreciate modern technology. It seems, however, that the overall quality of 10-print controls is being compromised by inferior livescan equipment. Many of the larger agencies in my area have seen fit to spend large amounts of grant monies on livescan terminals and have done away with ink and paper. It's quick, clean, and inferior, in my experience. I would appreciate some feedback from others on this (a search for "livescan" didn't turn up anything on CLPEX).

I am a bit frustrated because these systems (brand names unknown) seem to have been sold to administrators who have no experience in latent print examinations, and who have taken the sales hype at face value. Their main concern is with the increasing file cabinet space needed to store traditional fingerprint cards. It would appear to me that, at the point of capture with livescan, the image is usually suitable in the center pattern area, but often obscured at points of heavy contact (base of the first finger joint area). A "pass/fail" is all the system seems to feel is necessary. Usually, to their credit, the printed output from the original capture is very good, lower pattern areas near the 1st joint excepted, if the agency does in fact print out an original.

What fails dismally is the printed image which has been digitally compressed for storage, then uncompressed and printed. These images often have a neutral gray half-tone background, partially pixellated ridge contours, and a significant loss of Level III detail.

In addition, a few agencies are very reluctant to release their "original" copies of these livescan controls printed at the time of capture, and prefer to retrieve a compressed digital image and photocopy or (heaven forbid) fax them. I've requested controls from FBI files that are usually very finely photocopied, but have also received livescan copies recently which have been half-tone dotted to death. What these original copies hold for agencies who are so reluctant to part with them, I don't know. The originals are of no value hiding in a file, yet they are not always available for a latent print examiner to use. They are of no use to the agency who has no examiners.

We don't even have to mention palmprints. IF they manage to get the palm in the correct position on the screen...and it's a small screen, how wrong could you go??? Then, they forget to CLEAN the screen so you get bits and pieces of the last 25-30 palms that were placed there. And if there was just one guy that was really sweaty, you get HIS palmprints over and over, just with different names on them.

Years ago, in an unamed agency, the jail staff were told that the livescan machine would not only take the suspect's fingerprints...it would tell them who he was, TOO!!! And it was sooo simple to use, you only needed five minutes training time and you were good to go. So you have this agency, not the only one, that have never trained the people who take fingerprints on what a good fingerprint looks like, OR how to take palmprints, feeling that they could just slap the fingers and palms down any old way and, if a blob shows up on the viewing screen, that's fine.

Now, let's assume that you have a throwback to the good old days on ink who really DOES know how to roll a decent set of fingerprints. Even the very best livescan prints have significantly less quality than inked prints. As you said, third-level detail...faGEDDUBOUTit! Again, you can't fax a livescan printout unless you have a FAX machine with VERY FINE DETAIL control...and even then it usually sucks. I have written at least 4 times as many "Inconclusive" reports since I went to an agency with livescan than I did in the whole of my career with inked prints. Livescan Sucks.

I've talked to fingerprint examiners in my local area and they've said the Police in our area have figured out how to bypass the "reject fingerprint because it's rubbish" mode and just send the first image they do even if it's awful.

Doesn't that just make you warm and fuzzy all over?

There are so many variables as to why LiveScan won't give good results. I didn't like it for a while and now I am very happy with it.

My general history: I started looking at prints in 1972 so I grew up with ink and loved it but I have seen some pretty terrible results with ink, too.

My recent history: When I came to this agency about five years ago, they had an older LiveScan from Vendor A (I am not here to bash vendors so I won't name them). It produced adequate prints most of the time. It did not do palm prints. There was no way I could get the jail to ink up everyone's palms so I didn't push it.

About four years ago, the jail bought a new LiveScan from Vendor B. It also did not do palms. It was very inconsistent, producing a card with almost invisible prints to ones that so black, they were solid.

About two years ago, all the planets were in alignment. We were awarded money from a meth grant to get an AFIS computer and a new LiveScan that did palms. We went with Vendor C because they had both pieces and the Jail was not happy with the customer service they had received from Vendor B. Plus, I didn't want to get an AFIS from one vendor and a LiveScan from a second one even though they would both agree that they interfaced. I could just imagine the finger pointing that would happen when the system didn't work together.

So, now I am very pleased with the images of fingerprint cards that come out of the very high-end printer in my office. I keep all copies of all fingerprint cards (in file cabinets and boxes) and the images are uploaded directly into my AFIS from the LiveScan. A copy is also printed at the State Police ID Services on the same type of high-end printer. Unfortunately, the printer at the Jail is producing bad images - those copies go to the local police department with Latent Print Examiners. We are hooking up that agency so they now have a high-end printer at their location so they will get good quality images and won't have to drive to the Jail any more to pick up their cards.

The variables of LiveScan include the printer, the person rolling the card, the condition of the person's fingers (we have a large farm worker population and they have really bad fingerprints), the LiveScan capture system, and the AFIS that it might connect to. Now that I have a good printer, I realize that the old LiveScan might not have been too bad, even if it didn't do palm prints, but maybe it was the printer that was the problem.

Okay, I agree that I could do better prints with ink than even the best Jail Intake Deputy with the LiveScan, but I don't work 24 hours a day in the Jail. Plus, the jail is 25 miles away from my office. And, I would have to scan in each card individually into the AFIS.

To me, I can live with the very slightly poorer quality of the fingerprint cards for the convenience of having them print out in my office within seconds of a person being printed at the Jail and to have them immediately uploaded into my AFIS. I would rather spend my time searching latent prints through the AFIS than scan fingerprint cards. I have gotten a lot of great hits on latent fingerprints and palm prints with my system.

And, we have LiveID stations that will identify the person if they are in the database. One is at the entrance to the Jail so if the arresting official doubts the person's name, two fingers are scanned and checked. The other LiveID station is at the exit door. Scanning and checking two fingers prevents the wrong person being released. One of the Deputies told me he has matched over 50 people who have lied about their names using the system. It only works, however, if the person's prints are already in the database.

I think we have a very good system that works well. If you want to know the brand, contact me directly. I didn't want this to become a commercial or bashing for any vendor.

Kathy Saviers
Marion County Sheriff's Department

ksaviers@co.marion.or.us

I guess the rest of the world will have to live with the unsatisfactory results of being on the (b)leading edge of technology before it has been refined. My complaint is not so much with the original from the hi-res printer, it's with the retreived images from digital, compressed storage.

I, too, send many inconclusive examinations back. I think the reports often go into the file, seldom seen by investigators when they don't get a hit, and the examiners are regarded as incompetent because they continually complain about the quality of the new state of the art system and gripe that they can't see sufficient detail to work. All too often, we are isolated in the trenches and our results and requirements are never communicated to the top dogs who buy the equipment. Not one agency ever came to my lab asking to assist in evaluation of livescan terminals or vendors. No doubt they went with the low bidder. Many got what they paid for.

Ah, that Mecca of all government bureaucracies: the lowest bidder. Like those companies that are providing equipment for the soldiers in Iraq?
Oh, let's leave politics out of it, shall we? My agency has promised a high quality printer for the last two years. Latent Prints is clearly the low end of the totem pole...DNA Is the sexy science!

"We have been doing so much for so long with so little, that we are now qulitfied to anything with nothing."