Mr. DULLES. May I ask a question? Is this ridge formation, sort of two
ridges coming together, is that one of the most distinctive things you
look for? I note on these charts, Exhibit 634, the various examples you
have given us have been of one type so far.
Mr. LATONA. Two.
Mr. DULLES. I did not get the two. I get the two ridges coming
together with sort of the ending of a valley. You were saying there
were two distinctive things. I have only caught so far one distinctive
thing--that is the two ridges coming together in a kind of valley with
no exit.
Mr. LATONA. Two that come together, like a fork. And the other one was
the one that just ends by itself--does not join.
Mr. EISENBERG. Which is an interrupted ridge?
Mr. DULLES. I do not get the distinction.
Mr. EISENBERG. Is that an interrupted ridge you just described?
Mr. LATONA. What we call an ending ridge.
Mr. EISENBERG. Off the record.
(Discussion off the record.)
Mr. EISENBERG. Back on the record. Mr. Latona, could you prepare a
diagram which would show some of the characteristics, in broad outline,
which we have been discussing, and have those labeled, and could you
submit that diagram to us at a future date?
Mr. LATONA. Yes; I could.
Mr. EISENBERG. We will append it to your testimony, so that your
testimony may be more easily followed in the record--with the
permission of the Chairman.
Representative FORD. It will be prepared and submitted and included in
the record.
(The item referred to was later supplied and was marked Commission
Exhibit No. 634A.)
Mr. LATONA. Well, if you could give me your indulgence, I could do it
right here as fast as I did it on the board.
Representative FORD. Off the record.
(Discussion off the record.)
Representative FORD. Back on the record.
Mr. DULLES. These, I understand, are the particular distinguishing
points, the points that you would look for to determine whether the
latent print----
Mr. LATONA. Not so much the looking for the points, as to finding
points having a relationship to each other. It is the relation that is
the important thing, not the point itself. In other words, all of us
would have to a certain extent these points.
Mr. DULLES. They have to be in the same relation to each other.
Mr. LATONA. That is correct. For example, on the illustration I have
here----
Mr. EISENBERG. This is an illustration on the blackboard.
Mr. LATONA. The mere fact that this is an ending ridge and bifurcation
and another ending ridge and a dot in themselves mean nothing. This
is a type of pattern which is referred to as a loop, which is very
common. These comprise approximately 65 percent of pattern types. It
has four ridge counts, for example. You can find hundreds of thousands
and millions of four-count loops. But you would not find but one loop
having an arrangement of these characteristics in the relation that
they have. For example, the enclosure is related to this ending ridge.
This ending ridge is related by one ridge removed from the dot. This
bifurcation is next to the so-called core which is formed by a rod, the
ending ridge.
The points themselves are common. The most common type of points are
the ending ridge and the bifurcation. Those are the two points we have
covered so far.
Mr. EISENBERG. Mr. Latona, I see that you have marked nine
characteristics on your chart. Are these all the characteristics which
you were able to find----
Mr. LATONA. On this particular chart; yes. They were the only ones that
bore--actually, there is still one more characteristic--there could
have been 10.
Mr. EISENBERG. Now, is there any minimum number of points that has to
be found in order to make an identification, in your opinion?
Mr. LATONA. No; in my opinion, there are no number of points which are
a requirement. Now, there is a general belief among lots of fingerprint
people that a certain number of points are required. It is my opinion
that this is an erroneous assumption that they have taken, because
of the fact that here in the United States a person that qualifies
in court as an expert has the right merely to voice an opinion as to
whether two prints were made by the same finger or not made. There are
no requirements, there is no standard by which a person can say that a
certain number of points are required--primarily because of the fact
that there is such a wide variance in the experience of men who qualify
as fingerprint experts.
Mr. EISENBERG. Mr. Latona, you said that not all experts are in
agreement on this subject. Is there any substantial body of expert
opinion that holds to a minimum number of points, let's say, 12?
Mr. LATONA. In the United States, to my knowledge, I know of no group
or body that subscribe to a particular number. Now, quite frequently
some of these departments will maintain a standard for themselves,
by virtue of the fact that they will say, "Before we will make an
identification, we must find a minimum of 12 points of similarity."
I am quite certain that the reason for that is simply to avoid the
possibility of making an erroneous identification. Now, why they
have picked 12--I believe that that 12-point business originated
because of a certain article which was written by a French fingerprint
examiner by the name of Edmond Locard back in 1917, I think--there
was a publication to the effect that in his opinion where there were
12 points of similarity, there was no chance of making an erroneous
identification. If there were less than 12, he voiced the conclusion
that the chances would increase as to finding duplicate prints.
Now, today we in the FBI do not subscribe to that theory at all. We
simply say this: We have confidence in our experts to the extent that
regardless of the number of points, if the expert who has been assigned
to the case for purposes of making the examination gives an opinion,
we will not question the number of points. We have testified--I
personally have testified in court to as few as seven points of
similarity.
Mr. DULLES. But you would not on two, would you?
Mr. LATONA. No, sir; because I know that two points, even though they
would not be duplicate points, could be arranged in such a fashion that
it might possibly give me the impression that here are two points which
appear to be the same even though they are are not.
Mr. DULLES. But it is somewhere between two and seven--somewhere in
that range?
Mr. LATONA. That is right. Where that is, I do not know. And I would
not say whether I would testify to six, would I testify to five, would
I refuse to testify to four.
Mr. DULLES. You say you would--or would you?
Mr. LATONA. I don't know. That's a question I could not answer. I would
have to see each case individually before I could render a conclusion.
Now, going outside of the United States, we have been approached--I
mean the FBI--have been approached by other foreign experts in an
attempt to set a worldwide standard of 16 characteristics, a minimum of
16, as opposed to 12, which is generally referred to by people in this
country here. Now of course we would not subscribe to that at all. And
I think----
Mr. DULLES. That would be 16 on the fingerprint of the same finger?
Mr. LATONA. That's right.
Mr. DULLES. Obviously, if you have two fingers that would alter the
number--if you had three on one and two on the other, would you
consider that five?
Mr. LATONA. We would.
Now, whether the foreign experts would not, I don't know. In other
words, if we were to go along with this European theory of 16 points,
we would not testify to this being an identification. That is really
what it would amount to. Yet to me, in my mind, there is no question
that these prints here----
Mr. EISENBERG. Which is what exhibit?
Mr. LATONA. The enlargements in Exhibit 634--are simply reproductions
of the left index fingerprint of Lee Harvey Oswald.
Representative FORD. There is no doubt in your mind about that?
Mr. LATONA. Absolutely none at all. The fact that there are only the
nine points charted--and I feel this way, it is purely a matter of
experience. They simply do not have the experience that we have in
the FBI. The FBI has the world's largest practical fingerprint file.
We receive on an average of 23,000 to 25,000 cards a day which are
processed within a 3-day period.
Mr. DULLES. In a 3-day period?
Mr. LATONA. In a 3-day period.
Mr. DULLES. And by processed do you mean they are filed according to
certain characteristics?
Mr. LATONA. They are. At first they are recorded as having been
received from a particular agency, as to the number that we have
received, as to the type of the card. Then they are checked to see if
the impressions which are on the fingerprint card are complete and
legible, that they are placed in their proper sequence, that is they
are properly classified.
Then they are checked through our files to see if the person has or has
not a prior criminal record. Then a reply is prepared and forwarded to
the contributor. That is done in a 3-day period.
Mr. DULLES. How old is the art, roughly?
Mr. LATONA. Insofar as this country is concerned, I would say back to
1903, when the first fingerprint file for purposes of classification
and filing was set up in this country in New York.
Mr. DULLES. Did it start in France?
Mr. LATONA. No. Really, I daresay the English were probably as early as
any, or even down to South America--you have in Argentina the setting
up of fingerprint files as early as 1891. For a long time we never
recognized the fact that Argentina had a fingerprint file. I think it
is primarily because all of the works on fingerprinting were written
in Spanish, and it was just a question of finding somebody to take the
time and effort to translate it into English.
The French are credited with the so-called Bertillon system, which is a
measurement of the bone structure of the body. Alphone Bertillon was a
French----
Mr. DULLES. Didn't Bertillon go into fingerprints later?
Mr. LATONA. Very reluctantly. He was very reluctant to accept it. He
was a sort of diehard. He felt that his method, the measurement of
certain bones of the body, would not change after a person reached
the adult stage. But we know that that is not true. There is a
change--because of age, disease, dissipation. A person that was
once 6'2" may, because of the fact he is getting older, hump down a
little more and instead of being 6'2" he might be 5'11". Certain bone
structures over the years make certain changes--plus the fact that his
system was not a good system in that certain allowances had to be made
because of the way that people were measured.
Sometimes one operator might measure the bones of the arm, for example,
too tight, and another too loose. And they used the metric system of
measurement, which in terms of their measuring might sometimes mean
that the same person would not measure the same bone the same way twice.
We have the celebrated case here which we refer to as the Will West
case, here in the United States, in which a man was sentenced to the
penitentiary in Leavenworth. He was a colored man by the name of Will
West. The operator there, going through the mechanics of taking the
various measurements and his photograph, said, "I see you are back
here again." The man said, "No, this is the first time I have been to
Leavenworth." The operator was certain he had measured and photographed
this man before. He went to check his records and he came up with a
prior record which disclosed a Will West who had practically the same
Bertillon measurements as the man currently being examined.
He said, "Isn't this you?" And he showed him a picture. He looked at
the picture and recognized the picture as being one of himself. He
said, "Yes, that is me, but I have never been here before."
They checked the records and found still there in the penitentiary was
another Will West who looked almost exactly like a twin. But they were
not even related. Their features were the same, their measurements were
the same, but then their fingerprints were completely different.
If they made that error that one time, how many other times could the
same error have been made? And accordingly, we here in the United
States, around 1903--the Bertillon method was slowly put out of use. It
became obsolete.
Bertillon, before he died, conceded that fingerprints was a good means
of identification, and he very reluctantly conceded that the two
systems, his method and fingerprints together, would be an absolute
means of identification.
We completely did away with the Bertillon system. In fact, the FBI
never used it. We started our fingerprint work years after all that had
been resolved, back in 1924.
On July 1, 1924, that is actually when the FBI went into the
fingerprint business.
Mr. DULLES. Thank you very much. I found that very interesting.
Representative FORD. Go ahead, Mr. Eisenberg.
Mr. EISENBERG. Mr. Latona, did you also prepare a chart showing a
comparison of the latent and known left-index fingerprint of Lee Harvey
Oswald found on the paper bag, Exhibit 626?
Mr. LATONA. The left index finger. That is the one we just discussed.
Mr. EISENBERG. I'm sorry--the right palmprint.
Mr. LATONA. Right.
Mr. EISENBERG. And before we go any further, I should state for the
record that the exhibit we have been referring to as 626 was earlier
introduced as 142, and it is 142.
Mr. DULLES. Off the record.
(Discussion off the record.)
Mr. DULLES. Back on the record.