Carbon‐Based Fingerprint Powder as a One‐Step Development and Matrix Application for High‐Resolution Mass Spectrometry Imaging of Latent Fingerprints

Carbon‐based materials are often used as matrices for matrix‐assisted laser desorption/ionization mass spectrometry (MALDI‐MS) and its imaging (MALDI‐MSI). However, researchers have refrained from using carbon‐based fingerprint powder (CFP) as a matrix due to high background and contamination. In this work, the compatibility of CFP is reevaluated with MALDI‐MSI using a high‐resolution mass spectrometer (HRMS) and compared to traditional organic matrices. Relevant fingerprint compounds were easily distinguished from carbon cluster peaks when using HRMS. For fair comparison, half of a fingerprint was dusted with CFP while the other half was dusted with traditional organic matrices. All compounds studied had comparable, or higher, signal‐to‐noise (S/N) ratios when CFP was used as the matrix. Additionally, chemical image qualities closely followed the trend of S/N ratios. CFP proved to be an effective one‐step development and matrix application technique for MALDI‐MSI of latent fingerprints, when carbon cluster peaks are well separated by a HRMS.     

Body Transportation after Homicides: Offender and Offense Characteristics

Body transportation is defined as moving the body of the victim from the scene of a homicide to another location. We analyzed data on 513 South Korean homicide cases with convictions to compare 104 homicides involving the transportation of victims’ bodies with 409 homicides that did not. Offenders who transported their victims’ bodies were significantly younger and more likely to be related to the victims and were less likely to use sharp instruments and more likely to use blunt instruments or strangle the victims than offenders who did not. Victims of homicide involving body transportation were more likely to suffer injuries to the neck and head and less likely to suffer injuries to the torso. Finally, offenders who transported victims’ bodies were more likely to have planned the offense and destroyed evidence. The present findings have practical implications for police investigations.     

Arguing Against the Expressive Function of Punishment: Is the Standard Account that Insufficient?

Law and Philosophy - This paper critically appraises the arguments that have been offered for what can be called ‘the expressive function of punishment’. According to this view, what...     

Maximizing order or harm? Arrests among a social network of people who inject drugs in a large urban city

Encountering the criminal justice system at the first point of entry---an arrest---is associated with heightened HIV and Hepatitis risk behavior among people who inject drugs (PWIDS). Intervening structurally through the criminal justice system impacts public health; therefore, determining arrest patterns is an important tool for risk reduction. Among a sample of 740 PWIDs, and their social network members recruited from predominantly African-American neighborhoods in Baltimore City, a third were recently arrested in the previous six months, and of those, the arrests were disproportionately African-American persons and characterized as nonviolent, i.e., drug possession/attempt to purchase (38%) and loitering (29%). Poisson regression models were built adjusted for age, sex, race, education level, homelessness, and monthly income after exploring bivariable characteristics of arrests using chi-squared tests. Active drug use was associated with a recent arrest (adjusted prevalence ratio: aPR 2.38 95% CI 1.6, 3.6), in addition to participants who recently reported attending a syringe exchange program (aPR 1.45 95% CI 1.1, 2.0). Our findings are suggestive of recent media coverage and burgeoning research revealing the prioritization of policing resources toward both communities of color and neighborhoods of intensified drug trafficking. Further research is warranted to contextualize the operationalization of criminal justice resources and the impact on community health.     

Determinants of citizen support for community-oriented policing

The extent to which community members are willing to cooperate with the police and become involved with various community crime prevention programs depends on citizen perceptions of the police and of the community in which they reside. The purpose of the present study is to explore factors that affect support for community policing in a small rural city. Findings revealed that the majority of respondents supported community policing. Using community survey data collected from over 400 citizens in a small metropolitan area in the intermountain West, this study also explored the importance of demographic factors, community characteristics, and public perceptions and experiences with police in predicting citizens’ support for community policing. Citizen support for community-oriented policing varied somewhat by demographic factors (i.e., gender, education), and by community characteristics (i.e., disorder, social cohesion).     

The importance of dark adaptation for forensic examinations; an evaluation of the Crime-lite Eye™

Forensic practitioners are recommended to dark adapt their eyes prior to conducting evidential searches in the dark. The dark adaptation process remains poorly standardised across the discipline, with little quantified regarding the benefits of such preparative steps. Herein, we report the findings of a study that recruited 50 participants to assess the effectiveness of the Crime-lite Eye?, a darkness adaptation device developed to assist forensic practitioners both in the laboratory and in field. Participants were tasked with searching for the fluorescent signatures left by reaction of 1,8-diazafluoren-9-one (DFO) with amino acids, in a manner akin to the fluorogenic fingerprint treatment of porous evidence. Using an Epson Stylus Photo R265 inkjet printer, ink cartridges were filled with alanine solutions of various concentrations, allowing different motifs to be printed onto copy paper and subsequently developed using DFO. Participants searched for this ‘evidence’ both with and without dark adapted vision. On average, participants were able to locate and correctly recognise 16% more evidence once dark adapted using the Crime-lite Eye?.The increase in evidence located by participants once dark adapted suggests that crime scene officers should be dark adapting in order to visualise as much as possible. The time taken to dark adapt, 10?min on average during this study, is not excessively long, and should not significantly slow the investigation.     

Comparison of Rehydration Techniques for Fingerprinting the Deceased after Mummification

Postmortem decay causes fingertip decomposition, desiccation, shriveling, and rigidity, reducing the possibility of obtaining sufficiently clear fingerprints for identification. In this study, five rehydration solutions (ammonium hydroxide, sodium carbonate, potassium hydroxide, urea, and warm water) followed by three fingerprint recording methods (photograph, inking roll, and dusting tape) were investigated to process mummified fingertips from an unidentified cadaver. The results show that sodium carbonate treatment is the most effective for minutiae restoration, followed by ammonium hydroxide treatment. This study also demonstrates that even those fingertips that previously failed in urea solution, 1% potassium hydroxide solution, and warm water treatment could be further improved with sodium carbonate solution to obtain qualified minutiae for fingerprint matching. The optimal procedure is rehydrating the desiccated fingertips with sodium carbonate solution for 24 h followed by dusting the finger and transferring the print to adhesive tape.