Opinion ID: 2976668
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: The Boot Print

Text: During the course of the robbery, the suspect left a boot print on a piece of glass at a teller window; officers observed the suspect vaulting the countertop when they examined the bank’s surveillance photos. Officers removed the glass and sent it to a Federal Bureau of Investigation (“FBI”) lab for testing. Fingerprint specialist Derrick Weems (“Weems”) testified that the lab followed a specific protocol for examining evidence. Weems testified that when he saw the boot print on the glass, he sent it to the “Questioned Documents” department because the process that he 3 would employ to lift fingerprints would likely destroy the boot print. J.A. at 102 (Weems Test. at 58:2-6). Weems testified that once the shoe-print analysis had been completed, the glass was returned to him and he examined it for fingerprints. Weems testified that his fingerprint examination destroyed the boot print. Michael Smith (“Smith”), a forensic examiner with the FBI, conducted tests on the boot print. He testified that photography was part of the shoe-print analysis, and that one could perform the analysis by examining the shoe itself and a proper photograph of the print. Smith testified that forensic photography provides the best quality lift for a shoe print on a piece of glass. When asked why an electrostatic lift had not been his preferred method of examining the boot print, Smith replied that, although the electrostatic lift was a method generally accepted by the scientific community, he chose not to use the electrostatic lift because it could have damaged the fingerprint evidence on the glass.1 Smith testified that he did not know of a method, aside from the one that he used, to lift the boot print and still preserve any existing fingerprints. In addition, he testified that if he had known that fingerprints would not need to be lifted after his examination and if the photograph that he received from the forensic photographers “was not the quality that [he] wanted” J.A. at 179-80 (Smith Test. at 19:25-20:11), he might have used the electrostatic lift. Smith testified that he was sure, based on four points of comparison, that the positive identification between the boot submitted to him and the print on the glass was “one hundred percent accurate.” J.A. at 181 (Smith Test. at 21:19-21). Smith testified that the average number of points of comparison that allowed him to make a positive match was between four and seven. 1 Defense counsel tried to establish that Smith could not have been sure that fingerprints existed on the glass. Smith testified that he assumed that there were probably latent prints because the glass had been sent to him by the Latent Print Unit. 4 The defense expert, Garry Koverman (“Koverman”), examined both the boot and the forensic photograph of the glass imprint; he made his own test impression of the boot for purposes of his analysis. He concluded that Smith’s first three points of comparison were “significant points of identification.” J.A. at 240-41 (Koverman Test. at 81:23-82:10). When asked if the electrostatic lift “improves on the quality of what you have to view,” Koverman stated that “[i]t is not a hard-fast rule, but, generally, I would say yes.” J.A. at 219 (Koverman Test. at 59:9-14). The defense expert also testified that the photograph of the shoe that was taken “looked okay,” but that he would have taken more photographs “in the search for more characteristics.” J.A. at 226 (Koverman Test. at 66:1-5). In addition, he testified that it was not a reasonable scientific choice for the government lab to fail to perform a lift of the boot print. The electrostatic lift “could have increased the detail that could be seen,” J.A. at 227 (Koverman Test. at 67:21), which would have “increased the chances of identification and also exclusion.” J.A. at 227-28 (Koverman Test. at 67:25-68:1). Koverman testified that the failure to conduct an electrostatic lift “could have” affected the reliability of Mr. Smith’s opinion but that he did not “know that.” J.A. at 228 (Koverman Test. at 68:2-10). Finally, Koverman testified that he did not think that the four points of comparison were “sufficient to make an identification.” J.A. at 233 (Koverman Test. at 73:3-7).