A comparison of six fingerprint enhancement techniques for the recovery of latent fingerprints from unfired cartridge cases

This work compared the effectiveness of six different enhancement methods on six different sizes of brass cartridges. One sebaceous fingerprint was deposited onto twenty-five of each size of cartridge to enable a statistical evaluation of the enhancement methods for each cartridge size to be undertaken. The enhancement methods compared were superglue followed by BY40, superglue followed by gun blue followed by BY40, gun blue only, superglue followed by palladium deposition, palladium deposition only, and powder suspension. The six different cartridges used in this study were .22s, .32s, 9mm, .38s, ribbed shotgun, and smooth shotgun. The study found that more potentially identifiable fingerprints were enhanced on the larger cartridge cases. This was due to the surface area on the smaller cartridges, and in particular the .22s provided little ridge detail. Two techniques provided the best results - superglue followed by gun blue followed by BY40, and superglue followed by palladium deposition. This showed that the combination of the cyanoacrylate fuming and the metal oxidation reactions is increasing the yield of potentially identifiable fingerprints compared with the use of the techniques separately. Both techniques were also found to give reproducible results. These two enhancement techniques were also compared statistically and no statistical difference in their effectiveness was found suggesting both techniques are equally as effective at enhancing fingerprints on brass cartridge cases

The challenges of change:Exploring the dynamics of police reform in Scotland

Despite a long tradition of pessimism regarding the scope for meaningful change in police practices, recent structural reforms to police organizations in several European countries suggest that significant change in policing is possible. Drawing on recent research into the establishment and consequences of a national police force in Scotland, this article uses instrumental, cultural and myth perspectives taken from organization theory to examine how change happened and with what effects. It highlights how police reform involves a complex interplay between the strategic aims of government, the cultural norms of police organizations and the importance of alignment with wider views about the nature of the public sector. The article concludes by identifying a set of wider lessons from the experience of organizational change in policing

Delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) Measurement Uncertainty Dataset

Method validation data generated as part of quantifying the measurement uncertainty of delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC, the main active ingredient of cannabis) in whole Blood using SPE and LC/MS/MS Key words calibration curve, coverage factor, method validation, method precision, standard solutio

Mind the implementation gap?:Police reform and local policing in the Netherlands and Scotland

In 2013 the governments of the Netherlands and Scotland established national police forces, replacing a tradition of largely autonomous regional police organizations. In both jurisdictions, these radical reforms have raised concerns about the consequences of these national police structures for local policing and for relationships with local communities and local government. Drawing on documentary sources and interview material from each jurisdiction and informed by insights from the policy implementation literature, the key question addressed in this article is how has the legislation that created the new national police forces been put into effect at a local level? Focusing on the impact on the governance, organization and delivery of local policing, the article reveals how the implementation in both jurisdictions involves interpretation and discretion by multiple actors so that gaps are emerging between the national ‘policy promises’ set out in the legislation and the ‘policy products’ experienced in local contexts

Forensic science in Ghana: A review

The use of forensic science continues to grow across the world. In Ghana, major advancements took off in2011, including the introduction of modern DNA profiling and the establishment of an automated fingerprint identification system. These developments have led to some positive impacts on the delivery of justice, including the exoneration of a wrongly incarcerated individual. However, a review of the policy-related aspects of forensic science shows gaps in legislation, governance, service provision, quality assurance and accreditation, education and research. An important recommendation to improve forensic science in Ghana is the creation of a “national policy strategy”, a blueprint informed by relevant stakeholders, best practice from other countries and the status of the field. Resolutions to the policy issues identified in this review will ensure a more robust application of forensic science in delivering safe justice and enhancing public security

The enhancement and recovery of footwear marks contaminated in soil : a feasibility study

Little published research has been conducted on the chemical enhancement of soil contaminated footwear marks. Investigations into the application, including the advantages and limitations of processes available for the enhancement of footwear marks in soil were carried out as part of this study. This included a comparison of current enhancement solutions such as potassium thiocyanate, ammonium pyrrolidine dithiocarbamate, potassium ferrocyanide and bromophenol blue. The solutions were compared on the basis of sensitivity, sharpness of the colour reaction and their application to a range of commonly encountered substrates. The best preforming chemical enhancement technique for footwear impressions in soil was found to be potassium thiocyanate. Potassium thiocyanate was further explored to study the effects of aging the mark deposited as well as assessing the stability (shelf life) of the solution. It was found that the age of the mark appeared to have no significant effect on its ability to be chemically enhanced using potassium thiocyanate. The stability study of potassium thiocyanate revealed that whilst aged solutions still enhanced footwear marks, background staining, fading and deterioration in colour sharpness were all observed

Udgård III – Portlethen Raw Dataset

Following the meeting of the Fire and Explosion Investigation Working Group (FEIWG) of the European Network of Forensic Science Institutes (ENFSI) meeting in Tallinn, Estonia, 2018, the Scottish Police Authority (SPA) started a collaboration with the Nationalt Kriminalteknisk Center (NKC) during their visit to the Leverhulme Research Centre for Forensic Science (LRCFS), University of Dundee, United Kingdom. The Scottish Fire & Rescue Service (SFRS), SPA and NKC met and exchanged working practices in their respective jurisdictions. The meeting culminated in an invite for SFRS and SPA to attend the fire investigation training facility at Revinge, Sweden, as part of a training course run by NKC. This visit resulted in a proposal for collaboration amongst the LRCFS, SPA and SFRS, with close working ties with NKC, to create the first training facility of this kind in Scotland envisaging the use of converted storage containers. Two portable cabins were purchased, converted into rooms, and sited within the SFRS training facility at Portlethen, Scotland, United Kingdom. A dedicated working group ensured the facility set-up and ran to ensure maximum return for invested resources from all agencies involved. The shipping containers, in line with subsequent Udgard (Sept-2021) and Udgard II (April-2023) projects carried out by the collaboration between the LRCFS and NKC, have been named ‘Brigid’ and ‘Kelpie’.The LRCFS developed a standard operating procedure (SOP) for scene capture known as the ‘Dundee GT Protocol’, which was employed to carry out the photogrammetric acquisition of the scenes. The Udgård project enabled the digital registration of the site with a range of devices and scanning techniques, to be used to capture the same scenes across two phases: Beta (pre-fire crime scene) and Gamma (post-fire crime scene). The collection of the data presented in this dataset was performed in Portlethen, Scotland, United Kingdom on July 5th, 2023 (week 27). The collaboration between the LRCFS, SPA and NKC has successfully generated 3D reconstructions to be visualised in Virtual Reality (VR), to be used as both investigative and training tools. The LRCFS, SPA and NKC have agreed to share these co-created training and research materials produced during the crime scene exercises and live burns across all the participant organisations. The produced data will be used For education and training (including revenue-generating courses for both organisations) and the generation of outputs that may have exploitable commercialisation potential. All Udgård partners can access a downloadable database with the results from Udgård, such as lidar scanners, Matterport, still photographs, videos, and measurements of the sensors deployed at the scene. Keywords: forensic science, virtual reality, crime scene investigation, fire, photogrammetry, point cloud, 3d registration. The data are licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0). https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0