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4.14: RIDGEOLOGY

  • Page ID
    52993
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    In 1912, Alphonse Bertillon, who was warming to the science of fingerprint comparison, published a study that presented this latent print comparison and determined that 16 points were required for positive identification. This standard was adopted worldwide, most notably by Scotland Yard. Posters were printed bearing these “identified” fingerprints.

    Fingerprint image with numbered ridge patterns, illustrating various features and characteristics of the print.
    A detailed fingerprint pattern highlighted with numbered labels indicating specific features.
    Figure \(\PageIndex{1}\): Bertillon's 16-point comparison - Public Domain

    In 1986, Staff Sergeant David R. Ashbaugh, of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, examined this poster while on assignment in London, England, at Scotland Yard. As he stared at the poster, he noticed something interesting – the prints did not match. Bertillon had altered the prints, removing anything that did not match, and minutiae were outside of acceptable tolerances. The poster that hung on the wall of a prestigious identification bureau for 60 years was a fraud. It was then, however, that Sergeant Ashbaugh discovered what he later called “Ridgeology.” He understood that it was not sufficient for minutiae to be in the same position on the known and questioned fingerprints; rather, they had to be in agreement with their position on the ridge structure, that distortions, if present, had to be within acceptable tolerances, and that the special relationship and ridge sequence between ridges had to be in agreement as well. Further, he developed what he called the ACE-V methodology of comparison: Analyze, Compare (always the unknown to the known, and not vice-a-versa), Examine, and Verify (always a blind verification). A blind verification means that the second analyst is unaware of the findings of the original analyst.


    This page titled 4.14: RIDGEOLOGY is shared under a CC BY-SA 4.0 license and was authored, remixed, and/or curated by David Doglietto.

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