when was fingerprinting first used by the police
the early 20th century In 1840
title: Fingerprint text: a crime scene, or on items of evidence from a crime, have been used in forensic science to identify suspects, victims and other persons who touched a surface. Fingerprint identification emerged as an important system within police agencies in the late 19th century, when it replaced anthropometric measurements as a more reliable method for identifying persons having a prior record, often under a false name, in a criminal record repository. In modern times, researchers can find traces of addictive drugs on just a fingerprint. Fingerprinting has served all governments worldwide during the past 100 years or so to provide identification title: Fingerprint text: United States, Dr. Henry P. DeForrest used fingerprinting in the New York Civil Service in 1902, and by 1906, New York City Police Department Deputy Commissioner Joseph A. Faurot, an expert in the Bertillon system and a finger print advocate at Police Headquarters, introduced the fingerprinting of criminals to the United States. The Scheffer case of 1902 is the first case of the identification, arrest and conviction of a murderer based upon fingerprint evidence. Alphonse Bertillon identified the thief and murderer Scheffer, who had previously been arrested and his fingerprints filed some months before, from the fingerprints found on a title: Fingerprint text: they refuse to reveal the technique. In the 1930s criminal investigators in the United States first discovered the existence of latent fingerprints on the surfaces of fabrics, most notably on the insides of gloves discarded by perpetrators. Since the late nineteenth century, fingerprint identification methods have been used by police agencies around the world to identify suspected criminals as well as the victims of crime. The basis of the traditional fingerprinting technique is simple. The skin on the palmar surface of the hands and feet forms ridges, so-called papillary ridges, in patterns that are unique to each individual and which title: Fingerprint text: of criminals. Fingerprints are the fundamental tool in every police agency for the identification of people with a criminal history. They remain the most commonly gathered forensic evidence worldwide, and in most jurisdictions fingerprint examination is more common than all other forensic examination casework combined. Moreover, it continues to expand, with tens of thousands of people added to fingerprint repositories daily in America alone — far more than other forensic databases. Fingerprinting was the basis upon which the first forensic professional organization was formed, the International Association for Identification (IAI), in 1915. The first professional certification program for forensic scientists title: Fingerprint text: Lord William Russell, a provincial doctor, Robert Blake Overton, wrote to Scotland Yard suggesting checking for fingerprints but the suggestion, though followed up, did not lead to their routine use by the police for another 50 years. Some years later, the German anatomist Georg von Meissner (1829–1905) studied friction ridges, and five years after this, in 1858, Sir William James Herschel initiated fingerprinting in India. In 1877 at Hooghly (near Calcutta) he instituted the use of fingerprints on contracts and deeds to prevent the then-rampant repudiation of signatures and he registered government pensioners' fingerprints to prevent the collection of money