Identix also said that DOJ has placed an order, valued in excess of $600,000, for 21 TouchPrint PRO units and software upgrades to existing hardware previously supplied by Identix for the State's Department of Corrections live scan network. The first installment of eight units was be shipped and installed by the end of March 2003. The remaining units will be shipped and installed in the Company's fiscal fourth quarter ending June 30, 2003.
Cal DOJ currently has more than 600 Identix live scan systems deployed throughout California.
The TouchPrint PRO Full Hand live scan imager captures a continuous scan at 1000 dots per inch, from the carpal crease to the fingertips, in conformance with International Association for Identification (IAI) standards. A principal reason for recommending that the whole hand be live imaged, instead of just the palm portion, is to ensure that the palm portion of the hand can be matched to a particular human subject through the fingertip ridge information.
Adding full hand imaging capabilities is important because forensic examiners report that approximately one-third of all crime scene "latent" prints are not from fingertips, but are from other parts of the human hand. Although these images are rich in friction ridge detail, most of them go unmatched because of the relatively small database of on-file hand image exemplars that have been collected from arrested subjects. Thus, many forensic examiners believe that with the information currently available to investigators, many crimes go unsolved as a result of the inability to match the crime scene hand images with on-file images from known arrestees.