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Category: Project

Description: Eyewitness testimony has a longer history in the criminal legal system than forensic trace evidence—perhaps dating back to the first time one person accused another of wrong-doing. Like many forensic disciplines, eyewitness identification is frequently used in court, but unlike most, it is supported by decades of programmatic research and cu-mulative science. Today, the strengths and limitations of eyewitness evidence are well understood and have led to clear, evidence-based policy recommendations. At the same time, areas of weakness in eyewitness science have been identified as areas for future research and, eventually, policy change. Latent print examination shows similar promise as a field that could achieve foundational validity through continued research. However, there is a worrying tendency among forensic scientists and legal professionals to rely on a handful of studies to claim that foundational validity has been achieved. In this paper, we argue that foundational validity should be viewed as a continuum rather than a binary outcome, and we explore how the progress made in eyewitness identification research can inform efforts to build a stronger scientific foundation for latent print examination.