The Hand on the Mirror

Abstract

Handprints naturally occur due to the glands in our skin that secrete oils leaving ridged patterns behind. This is called a latent handprint. Much research has been done on the idea of latent fingerprints and its continued use as evidence. What has not been researched much is the idea of handprints being used as forensic evidence. Forensically, handprints can be useful in re-creating a crime scene. There have been a number of instances where handprints have been seen and depending on how they appear, have been deemed “ghostly” prints or “alien like” prints. Research on handprints using a specific case will be done to prove that a variety of unusual handprints can be made with human hands. More specifically, working with a case directly associated with the author of “Hand On the Mirror”, we will be analyzing handprints using different forensic analysis methods.