The Bertillon system created by Alphonse Bertillon in 1879 included a series of bodily measurements for identification, these measurements of the body served as a way to distinguish one person from another. The Bertillon system included a number of measurements such as height, width of arm span, sitting height, head dimensions, foot dimensions, fore arm dimensions and exedra until all bodily measurements are recorded. These bodily measurements created by Alphonse Bertillon seemed to be the most accurate way to identify people in the early 1880’s but after 2 decades of use it was determined that bone measurements were highly susceptible to error when untrained personnel took the measurements, many people had the wrong measurements taken of their bone structures that presented a problem with officials in determining one inmate from another. Finger printing then became the system of choice.
Some of the features that allowed finger printing to be more accurate than the Bertillon system are the fact that finger ridges never change during a person’s life span. Using Galton’s work to determined a system for recognition of finger prints many agencies decided to change their system of classification over to the finger print classification system after it had proven to be very effective in not just identifying criminals but also catching people in criminal acts by their finger prints.
References:
Criminalistics An introductory To Forensic Science Ninth Edition Richard Saferstien Copyright 2007 Sadle River NewJersey, 07458
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