FINGER PRINT DETECTION

Waikato Independent, Volume XXIV, Issue 2390, 30 October 1924, Page 2

FINGER PRINT DETECTION

TERROR OP THE CROOK. THE INFALLIBLE TESTS. (Bv :i Special Commissioner of "The Sunday News.") Superintendent Charles Stoe.kley Collins, of Scotland Yard, is retiring. livery police force in the world knows him.

Hi' is Scotland Yard's expert on fingerprints ,a method of tracing' ami identifying - criminals, first, adopted by the London police just -.*! years ago, and now in use in every land. It has been the life-work of Superintendent Collins to organise and improve this simple but unerring' weapon for the fight against crime. If was Mr Collins' good fortune to be a detective-sergeant known for keenness and hard work when Sir .Edward Henry (then Chief Commissioner) was introducing the fingerprint system. Sir Edward had already studied the great possibilities of such a. system in India, and in July, 1901. the. Home Secretary ordered it to be adopted at Scotland Yard and used throughout the country. His Great Chance. Then it was that the keen young de-tective-sergeant got his chance. He was put into the fingerprints department, and from that day fingerprints became his great passion. To-day he has at Scotland Yard nearly half a million sets of fingerprints, all so carefully filed and indexed that, he can refer to any one of them almost in a moment. If a burglar left a thumb mark on the paint of your room, he could tell you whether he already has that mark in his collection. If, as is very probable, he has, he will soon tell you all about the man. If yon have ever looked at a. fingerprint—and you can experiment with your own—you will realise how marvellous is the system by which any one print can he picked out of nearly half a million, for to the non-expert they all look very much alike. Every Finger Different. Every man. woman, and child in the world has different fingerprints. Your fingerprints are not the same as those of anyone else. If they were put among the hundreds of thousands at Scotland Yard an expert could pick them out again. Sometimes men's faces look alike, so that we say every man has his "double," but no fingerprint, has its "double."

The fingerprints never vary, from the cradle to the grave. Tests have shown that the fingerprint of the baby will be exactly the same, though, they will, of course, be bigger, when the baby is a. grown man.

But all this wonderful fact would be of little use if fingerprints could not be classified for quick and easy reference. Superintendent Collins' work has been especially valuable because he has devised all sorts of methods of referring quickly and accurately to different prints, and sending descriptions of them to other police forces wlien it is desired to identify a. man. It looks an im-, possible task to write a telegram that would convey clearly the required information, but Superintendent Collins has written a "Telegraphic Code of Fingerprints" by which it is now possible in a few words to cable a. description of a man's fingerprints around the world.

A girl awoke in the half-darkness of early morning to find a man ransacking her room. It flashed on her mind that, though she could not detain the man single-handed; he could be afterwards identified if she could get his fingerprints on some such surface as a piece of glass. So she sat up in bed and cried: "I'm choking. Quick, give me some water."

Th(! in (ruder, startled, ('omul a bottle of writer in tlie room, poured out a glassful for the girl, and tlien bolted. The police were informed, the 111:111 's fingerprints were found on the glass, and photographed, and by means of them he was traced, arrested, and convicted.

At the head of the long list of fingerprints triumphs of which Superintendent Collins keeps a careful record is one of special interest, for it was the first conviction ever obtained in this country by this method. The First Fingerprint Case.

A man was charged at Lamboath with being concerned with burglaries in South London. The case was reported in the "Daily Chronicle" of: .September 3rd, 1002, as follows:

For the purpose of connecting prisoner with a burglary at Denmark Hill, some remarkable evidence was given by Detective-Sergeant Collins, of New Scotland Yard. Two days after the burglary the officer went to the premises, and found some fingermarks on the freshly-painted woodwork, of which he made a photographic enlargement. After (he prisoner was in custody the sergeant visited him in Brixton Prison, and took an impression of his left thumb. A photographic enlargement of this impression was made, and the two photographs were compared. In his evidence Sergeant. Collins said he carefully compared the details of the two prints, and, having for a number of