I was told by a towing company employee that they only check if a crime was committed. But stealing a car is a felony! If they got one print and matched it in the database we'd have more car thieves off the streets, right? How long does it take to dust for prints?
2006-07-31 10:46:01 · 11 answers · asked by Anonymous in Politics & Government ➔ Law Enforcement & Police
It's way too time consuming and officers can be out doing better things. Manpower and money, lack of it. Those same forensics folks are probably busy dusting a murder scene, know what I mean? :)
2006-07-31 10:50:47 · answer #1 · answered by sherijgriggs 6 · 1⤊ 0⤋
Work as a dispatcher, and with most smaller towns they have to send there finger prints off to a larger place to get tested and identified, costing about 700-900 a finger print (was a answer from our evidence tech) Now the smaller departments can't justify spending that if there is no large crime committed. You can however contact your insurance agency and see if they will get the fingerprinting done. As for larger departments as many cars as they have stolen, it would cost a small fortune in people-hours to run down every car thief, after paying for the evidence. Not saying they shouldn't dust every car, but just giving you the reasons why my department does not.
2006-07-31 13:02:09 · answer #2 · answered by Dave O 2 · 2⤊ 0⤋
Most police will dust stolen cars if asked. However, here is the downside. The interior is the only place where prints can be admitted into evidence effectively. And, inside your car there are tons of different peoples prints. So we would have to interrogate you, your mom, your dad, your friends, etc. Also, there is almost NO surface inside a car that a print will show up. In addition, the interior of your car will be damaged so bad by fingerprint dust that will not come out. So, you would ruin your car, get your friends in trouble, and never actually find the thief. We rarely catch car thieves unless they are caught in the act or someone sees them do it.
2006-07-31 11:07:51 · answer #3 · answered by John D 2 · 1⤊ 0⤋
Okay, here's the answer from the cop:
First: Fingerprints can usually only be lifted from hard, smooth, non-pourus surface. That pretty much eliminates your steering wheel and your entire dash and anything cloth. Look at it closely, it has grooves everywhere.
Sencond: Pretty much everywhere they touched (handle, ignition, shifter, radio) you touch EVERY SINGLE DAY. You can't lift one print from ontop of another.
Thrid: Have you ever tried to clean up fingerprint powder? Good damned luck! Here's a hint on how hard it is to clean. When were dusting someone's property and they're being a pain in the rear (like saying "I pay your salary"), we throw as much print powder as we can in every direction. We even dust the areas that I just said you can't get prints off of! If we think we cant get prints and the person is a decent guy, we'll spare him the headache of cleaning the powder up.
2006-08-01 05:01:02 · answer #4 · answered by Family Guy 3 · 1⤊ 0⤋
1. any print on the outside of the car can't be used to convict for stealing the car, since it don't put them on the inside of the car.
2. to get a print on the steering wheel or the arm rest or door handle, you have to take them off of the car and take them to the lab and process. ( most people don't want thier car taken apart if they have just found it
3. And the time and effort in taking them is just not normally worth it, very view hits were ever found that can be used in court. ( again the print on the inside still only proves they were in the car, you still have to prove they were the ones who stole it)
I know it sounds bad but it is a matter of money, it costs money to have a officer spend 2 or 3 hours at the car and then a couple more hours in a lab processing the evidence and prints. Plus the time and cost to keept he fingerprint evidence.
2006-07-31 16:54:41 · answer #5 · answered by Anonymous · 2⤊ 0⤋
Think about this. Do you know how many finger prints are on or in the average car. There are literally hundreds of sets of prints. ANYONE who touches your car leaves prints. They would have to process all the prints and then HOPE to find a match, and then they would have to show that this person is the one that took the car. And if this thief has never been caught then his/her prints will NOT be on file and they will have wasted all this time.
2006-07-31 10:52:07 · answer #6 · answered by GRUMPY 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
It's alot easier to just ride around and write tickets for every little thing they can find.Dusting for prints would take much effort.They just would lock the guy up if they did catch him.Aint no money in that.They can make a lot more money riding around giving tickets than real crimes.They dont care nothing about you are your car,it's a money thing.
2006-07-31 12:07:37 · answer #7 · answered by pops 3 · 0⤊ 2⤋
the reason is that for 1...some surfaces are hard to pull prints from and 2 touching certain areas...such as the outside of the car isn't illegal and can't tie them to the crime. and it only takes about 10 minutes if they know where to dust
2006-07-31 10:51:02 · answer #8 · answered by anthony v 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
fingerprints arent easy to find.in fact the tv makes it look like they find them at every seen.but this isnt true
2006-07-31 13:03:20 · answer #9 · answered by WHEREISJUSTICE 2 · 1⤊ 0⤋
my guest is about 20 or 30 minutes
2006-07-31 10:50:15 · answer #10 · answered by 2qut4U 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋