Quality Assurance Flashcards
How was the chain of custody for these exhibits maintained while they were in your possession?
Whenever exhibits arrive at the Fingerprint Section, the chain of custody is updated on the Police computer network to show where the exhibit is now located, as well as the time and date that it was received.
All exhibits for this file were hand delivered to the South Island Forensic Fingerprints Section by various Customs and Police members, and once received, the location of these exhibits were updated on the NZ Police Computer network so that the chain of custody for those items was accurate.
While in the Custody of the Fingerprint Section, all exhibits were held in the Fingerprint Laboratory exhibit store, which requires card access and can only be accessed by authorised Police members.
Following the completion of my examination, all exhibits were either handed back to the submitting officer, or were hand delivered to the Christchurch Exhibit Store, and again the chain of custody for these items was updated on the NZ Police Computer network.
You labelled several fingerprints ‘A’, how can we tell the difference between these fingerprints?
The exhibits that were examined in the forensic lab for this file arrived in groups at different times.
Each group of exhibits was assigned a different job number, which ranged from ‘21/4/11411’ to ‘21/4/11411/09’.
For each of these jobs I used a labelling sequence beginning with ‘A’. So although there may be multiple fingerprints labelled ‘A’, these fingerprints may be distinguished by the job number that they are associated with.
How did you protect these exhibits from cross-contamination?
