A fingerprint left on the inside of a toilet paper roll was an important clue as the New York State Police chased Ralph James “Bucky” Phillips between his escape from a county jail in April until his capture in September.
The roll was found in a car that Phillips was believed to have stolen.
The state police were able to develop a fingerprint invisible to the naked eye by processing the toilet paper roll with Ninhydrin - an agent that develops amino acids from the human skin - and subjecting it to increased heat and humidity in a chamber bath to accelerate the reaction.
“It was Bucky's fingerprint,” said Thomas Gehl, a New York State Police Senior Investigator with Troop E's Forensic Identification Unit.
Once upon a time, the only evidence that could be gathered was what investigators could see. But now forensic evidence-gathering has expanded to find physical proof of a perpetrator that isn't visible to the naked eye.
In the Troop E's 1960s-era Canandaigua laboratory kept in pristine condition, Super Glue can bring up seemingly invisible fingerprints. In a recent Steuben County case, usable fingerprints were developed from a two-year-old sample when the glue was combined with a dye-stain and alternate light source, New York State Police Investigator Lee Stonebraker said.
During a demonstration last month, Stonebraker spread iron filings on a safe door - an old piece of evidence used for training - to bring up fingerprints. He spread tape over a fingerprint. If it had been real evidence to be processed, several pictures would have been taken before and after the application of the filings and the tape.
In another fingerprint-lifting demo, he distributed a thin film of glue over the fingerprint before lifting it up with the tape to then process it in the fuming chamber.
The state police, the Auburn Police Department and the Cayuga County Sheriff's Office all have a Super Glue fuming chamber that can be used to bring out latent fingerprints treated with chemicals.
Sgt. Joseph DiVietro, of the Auburn Police Department's Identification Bureau, utilizes test kits that can show trace metals of a weapon used in the commission of a crime on a suspect's hands. Another kit can restore serial numbers filed down from a gun.
Field test kits can distinguish blood from other red-colored stains to help investigators hone in on where samples should be taken form.
The state police also use an alternate light source scope that filters through the visible spectrum of light to find stained areas not visible to the naked eye. Investigators wear varying colors of goggles to see the stains highlighted by the alternate light source scope.
Hand-held ultraviolet lights also help investigators spot semen or other body fluids not readily visible at a crime scene. Blood doesn't fluoresce well under the alternate light source scope or the hand-held lights, so chemicals like Amido Black and Luminol are used to bring up hidden blood stains.
The point of all of these technologies: find hidden evidence that can be sent to be tested at a criminal laboratory or pursued in-house toward solving a crime.
DiVietro said the two things that have changed the most in his field are DNA testing and the availability of high-quality surveillance. The APD's wireless video system allows the department to set up surveillance in businesses where victims think they are getting ripped off but don't have the definitive proof, DiVietro said.
The system can be placed in props and can get a color video record from 400 to 500 feet away, DiVietro said.
The shift to digital photography by the sheriff's office and the state police has eliminated the possibility of losing crime scene images if a roll of film has failed and allows investigators to take as many pictures as desired.
There are databases available to the agencies to compare tire tread from suspect vehicles, to compare footwear of suspects and that offer a perusal of photographs taken by satellite of an entire community.
W. Mark Dale, director of the State University of New York at Albany's Northeast Regional Forensic Institute, said forensics have recently advanced because of DNA testing technology, the Automated Fingerprint Identification systems that use digital imaging technology to store and analyze fingerprints from across the country and the National Integrated Ballistic Information Network that uses digital imaging technology to analyze firearms in comparison to images of fired bullets and cartridge cases from crime scenes.
Most famously, in short tandem repeat (STR) DNA testing forensic scientists can test across 13 DNA regions that vary from person to person to create a DNA “fingerprint” of a person. There is a minuscule chance that another person would have the same DNA profile for the same set of regions.
Scientists need smaller and smaller samples of body fluids to do an analysis that results in a statistically sound sample. The samples are amplified through a technique called Polymerase Chain Reaction that amplifies a DNA sample by copying it over and over.
“Those 13 regions when used together create a statistical result that is overwhelming,” Dale said.
Staff writer Amaris Elliott-Engel can be reached at 253-5311 ext. 282 or at amaris.elliot-engel@lee.net
The state police were able to develop a fingerprint invisible to the naked eye by processing the toilet paper roll with Ninhydrin - an agent that develops amino acids from the human skin - and subjecting it to increased heat and humidity in a chamber bath to accelerate the reaction.
“It was Bucky's fingerprint,” said Thomas Gehl, a New York State Police Senior Investigator with Troop E's Forensic Identification Unit.
Once upon a time, the only evidence that could be gathered was what investigators could see. But now forensic evidence-gathering has expanded to find physical proof of a perpetrator that isn't visible to the naked eye.
In the Troop E's 1960s-era Canandaigua laboratory kept in pristine condition, Super Glue can bring up seemingly invisible fingerprints. In a recent Steuben County case, usable fingerprints were developed from a two-year-old sample when the glue was combined with a dye-stain and alternate light source, New York State Police Investigator Lee Stonebraker said.
During a demonstration last month, Stonebraker spread iron filings on a safe door - an old piece of evidence used for training - to bring up fingerprints. He spread tape over a fingerprint. If it had been real evidence to be processed, several pictures would have been taken before and after the application of the filings and the tape.
In another fingerprint-lifting demo, he distributed a thin film of glue over the fingerprint before lifting it up with the tape to then process it in the fuming chamber.
The state police, the Auburn Police Department and the Cayuga County Sheriff's Office all have a Super Glue fuming chamber that can be used to bring out latent fingerprints treated with chemicals.
Sgt. Joseph DiVietro, of the Auburn Police Department's Identification Bureau, utilizes test kits that can show trace metals of a weapon used in the commission of a crime on a suspect's hands. Another kit can restore serial numbers filed down from a gun.
Field test kits can distinguish blood from other red-colored stains to help investigators hone in on where samples should be taken form.
The state police also use an alternate light source scope that filters through the visible spectrum of light to find stained areas not visible to the naked eye. Investigators wear varying colors of goggles to see the stains highlighted by the alternate light source scope.
Hand-held ultraviolet lights also help investigators spot semen or other body fluids not readily visible at a crime scene. Blood doesn't fluoresce well under the alternate light source scope or the hand-held lights, so chemicals like Amido Black and Luminol are used to bring up hidden blood stains.
The point of all of these technologies: find hidden evidence that can be sent to be tested at a criminal laboratory or pursued in-house toward solving a crime.
DiVietro said the two things that have changed the most in his field are DNA testing and the availability of high-quality surveillance. The APD's wireless video system allows the department to set up surveillance in businesses where victims think they are getting ripped off but don't have the definitive proof, DiVietro said.
The system can be placed in props and can get a color video record from 400 to 500 feet away, DiVietro said.
The shift to digital photography by the sheriff's office and the state police has eliminated the possibility of losing crime scene images if a roll of film has failed and allows investigators to take as many pictures as desired.
There are databases available to the agencies to compare tire tread from suspect vehicles, to compare footwear of suspects and that offer a perusal of photographs taken by satellite of an entire community.
W. Mark Dale, director of the State University of New York at Albany's Northeast Regional Forensic Institute, said forensics have recently advanced because of DNA testing technology, the Automated Fingerprint Identification systems that use digital imaging technology to store and analyze fingerprints from across the country and the National Integrated Ballistic Information Network that uses digital imaging technology to analyze firearms in comparison to images of fired bullets and cartridge cases from crime scenes.
Most famously, in short tandem repeat (STR) DNA testing forensic scientists can test across 13 DNA regions that vary from person to person to create a DNA “fingerprint” of a person. There is a minuscule chance that another person would have the same DNA profile for the same set of regions.
Scientists need smaller and smaller samples of body fluids to do an analysis that results in a statistically sound sample. The samples are amplified through a technique called Polymerase Chain Reaction that amplifies a DNA sample by copying it over and over.
“Those 13 regions when used together create a statistical result that is overwhelming,” Dale said.
Staff writer Amaris Elliott-Engel can be reached at 253-5311 ext. 282 or at amaris.elliot-engel@lee.net
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