Forensic Document Examination

It is also called as Questioned Document it is a very broad and interesting field that relates to the examination of documentary evidence and submit in a court of law using scientific techniques such as suicide notes, Bank documents, personal documents, etc. Question Document means anything (marks, sign, symbols) which return on any surface which have an unknown authenticity. This authenticity is analysed by a questioned document examiner. The examination is done based on characteristics of handwriting. Commonly the cases that come under forensic document examination are “white-collar crimes” like identity theft, forgery, faking, fraud, or mumbling a forged statement. The examination is done by some steps are analysis, comparison, and evolution.

Security Features of Indian Currency Notes

The Indian Rupee (Currency:INR ) is the official currency of India . The above shown picture is the 100 rupee note of the Indian Currency.

Following are the Security features of the Indian 100 rupee currency note we need to observe to know it’s authenticity

• Intaglio Print
• Security Thread
• Fluorescent Ink
• Optically Variable Ink
• Micro lettering
• Latent Image
• See through register

And we can observe some features under UV light clearly as shown in the above image

Development of Secret Writing

The above shown image is about development of Secret Writing by heating. Secret writing is means of written communication where by the spy conceals the actual written text, whether it is enciphered or encoded or not. The techniques of secret writing include the use of Invisible Ink, vegetable juices, fruit juices, biological fluids, Baking soda, vinegar, milk.And if they used the above items the secret writing can be deciphered by heating the particular document in question.

Identification of Ink

In Questioned Document evidence we can do ink analysis according to its composition and how much the ink absorbed by the paper. In the above evidences the pictures(Figure-03 (a&b)) are microscopically identified by stereomicroscope. In this we identified the absorption of ink by the fibres of the paper of questioned sample is identified.

Examination of Class Characteristics

In Questioned Document the identification and examination is done by the examination of class and individual handwriting characteristics which are unique to a person .

In the above samples there are two different handwriting samples with different class characteristics like:

• Pictorial effect
• Alignment
• Slant
• Movement
• Dimensions

Detection of Forgery

Forgery: The creation of false written document or alteration of genuine one with the intent for defraud

Features of Forgery: The various features of Forgery are frequent lifts, frequenct stops, hesitation, patching or retouching, slowline quality, Unnatural tremors etc..

In the above figure there are two different samples of signatures showing original and forged signatures with marking the differences.

Charred Documents

A document that has become Blackened and brittle by burning or exposure to excessive heat is classified as a “Charred Document”. Accidentally Burnt documents or those Intentionally destroyed are referred to the forensic laboratories for restoration and decipherment of writings on them. The charred documents are very important in some cases. These cases have been reported in which the act of arson was done just to destroy the important documents. The culprits usually find an easy way to destroy the evidences in the form of documents is to burn them.

This is the typewriter which is used for typing documents earlier. We can detect class characteristics and individual characteristics from the documents typed by the typewriter. This can help to detect which typewriter was used to write the particular document and this can help to find the individual who wrote that mote.

This is a method of revealing indented writing by the help of shading method. When we find any piece of note in which we can feel any indented writing is present to see what is written we do shading method. A light shade of graphite pencil can reveal the writings and can help to read any note.