Abstract
This chapter presents and discusses, in 28 sections, a link analysis tool for the British police, FLINTS. The chapter considers, in turn, the motivations and history of the project; the early beginning resulting in FLINTS 1; identifying “unknown” offenders, and systemising it; link detection; more about the first generation of FLINTS; integrations, linking and analysis tools; expanding FLINTS to other police areas; volume crimes and volume suspects; performance monitoring and system identification; a tour of FLINTS as the user sees it; the intellectual foundations; and what stands out in FLINTS. We turn to a case study in linked burglary. We then discuss forensic decision-making; second-generation FLINTS; access to the system (searching vs. surfing); asking questions about people and suspects; asking questions about crimes and events; displaying modified Wigmore Charts, and the graphical results in FLINTS; geographical analysis; temporal analysis; prolific (volume) offenders search; using geography to identify prolific offenders; hot spot searches; vehicle searching; and analytical audit trails.
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Notes
- 1.
See Section 3.2 in this book.
- 2.
This includes police officers, Crime Scene Investigators and lawyers.
- 3.
Following my appointment as a Detective in 1981 in the inner City of Birmingham, England, I found the lack of determination that some investigators adopted in the search for evidence in their investigations was surprising. In particular, the search for evidence in pursuit of one side of the story struck me. I cannot claim that this bias was borne of some high-grounded moral attitude, but rather, quite simply, of the futility of learning all sides of the story. It became apparent fairly early on that evidence is always available, in some form, somewhere, and it is only our determination and ingenuity in finding it that is in question. Furthermore, any collection of evidence eventually has to be tested by others. These may be Crown Lawyers, Defence Lawyers, a Jury or a Judge, and any suspect; therefore, I had a responsibility not only to satisfy my own view of the evidence, but also to demonstrate that I had tested arguments in favour of my hypothesis as well as those counter to it. This paid off many times, particularly in generating new sources of covert information from within the criminal fraternity. Balance and fairness demonstrates reliability, which was something that informants sought from an investigator when seeking to impart information, especially in cases involving violent or serious crime. Anticipating the opposing view, seeing evidence from different perspectives and demonstrating that evidence had been collected in support as well as negation of a hypothesis was crucial. Whilst it is never possible to overturn every possible stone, it is possible to demonstrate that one has overturned every reasonable stone, bearing in mind the available evidence and the issues under investigation.
- 4.
To this end, forensic is meant to portray an interrogative, questioning approach. The Shorter Oxford English Dictionary defines the term as “pertaining to, connected with, or used in courts of law; suitable or analogous to pleadings in court, or a speech or written thesis maintaining one side or the other of a given question.”
- 5.
I argued that much in chapter 1 of my doctoral dissertation.
- 6.
Here, the term “know” does not mean a fact that has been established beyond challenge. It means instead “that which we are prepared to accept on the basis of reliable evidence currently in our possession”.
- 7.
Challenge may come in the form of counter-arguments put forward by our adversaries or, just as importantly, counter-arguments we construct ourselves to test some argument that we are naturally persuaded by. The former is simple; adversaries or colleagues may favour another argument or explanation that they put to us in the form of a challenge, and we can deal with it on that basis. The latter is sometimes difficult because it involves constructing counter-assertions ourselves, often in the knowledge that we are already satisfied with the current explanation. The approach may go something like this: “Is this explanation or argument sustainable if new evidence were to be made available?” Alternatively, it may go like this: “Is my explanation or argument sustainable in the light of the following alternative hypothesis?” This thought process may involve considering a range of possible explanations or arguments ranging from that which is highly probable to that which is highly improbable. It may also involve considering that which is impossible. The reason for this is simple: that which is impossible on the basis of evidence currently available may become possible in the light of new evidence or some other explanation. The process may instead be as simple as viewing the evidence we currently have in a different light or from a different standpoint.
- 8.
Crime stain means DNA recovered in some form from a crime scene and that awaits matching against reference samples stored in a database. A match with one of these samples would enable the investigator or analyst to formulate a hypothesis that the individual may have had the “opportunity” to commit the crime. It does not necessarily mean that they did commit the crime.
- 9.
In addition to the problem of false positives and adventitious matches, investigators and analysts should also keep in mind that identical twins share the same DNA code. Identical twins (monozygotes) originate from a single embryonic cell and therefore share the same genomic DNA. Therefore, wherever monozygotic twins are suspected of involvement in a crime, both must be considered “suspects” and therefore both must be treated for the purposes of an investigation as requiring us to eliminate them from suspicion. The hypothesis that the virtual suspect or offender may be one of two identical twins must always be considered.
- 10.
The ideal position is to be able to eliminate all persons except one. Once we have reduced the uncertainty to a single individual, we can then use other evidential tests to challenge the reliability of the analysis and conclusion.
- 11.
This concentration on the use of a name as a means to identify people is surprising bearing in mind the large proportion of the population that share the same name. Some with the same name even share the same date of birth.
- 12.
A virtual suspect or offender is a person who is known to exist because evidence of their presence at a scene of crime has been discovered, but whose identity is yet to be established.
- 13.
For example, the original Indicators (DNA, tattoo, age and hair colour) that we discovered from Event 4 are marked with a red # sign. Because the same DNA profile was found at Events 2 and 4, we can infer that all details for Event 4 should also apply to Event 2. These inferred indicators are marked with a blue # sign.
- 14.
Evidence should always be subjected to questions about its reliability, relevance and probative force.
- 15.
A finger mark at linked crime 6 suggests the name “George Smith” as a suspect. Smith may possess DNA profile type A. If so, we can connect him with the series of 10 linked crimes. If he does not, one of his associates may. Other evidence types may indicate additional links between other crimes and Smith as well as other series of crimes and other suspects. Some of the new suspects may be connected to Smith as associates.
- 16.
One of those crimes may have been detected or there may be an item of evidence at any one of the crime scenes that may provide an insight into the identity of the “virtual suspect or offender”.
- 17.
This system was the prototype version of FLINTS.
- 18.
FLINTS was designed on the basis of Intellogic as an executable computer programme for use in forensic investigation. Other applications were not pursued as computer programmes at this stage.
- 19.
The enquiry work referred to is often called an action package. This package is a file of evidence produced by FLINTS that contains all the necessary evidence, photographs, plans and ancillary intelligence necessary to carry out an enquiry and usually leads to the arrest of a suspect. The suspect is normally the target in the action package.
- 20.
Fingerprint matches are input automatically, but their quality must be checked by the intelligence system’s manager.
- 21.
“Although Conan Doyle wrote 56 short stories featuring Holmes, A Study in Scarlet is one of only four full-length novels in the original canon. The novel was followed by The Sign of Four, published in 1890. A Study in Scarlet was the first work of fiction to incorporate the magnifying glass as an investigative tool” (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Study_in_Scarlet). The novel’s quite negative portrayal of Mormons was heavily prejudiced and even libellous, as Conan Doyle allegedly eventually came to acknowledge (ibid.).
- 22.
Schum (1994) provides a diagram illustrating these processes. Their uses are in the generation and testing of hypotheses.
- 23.
FLINTS was adopted by the West Midlands Police, the Warwickshire Constabulary, the West Mercia Constabulary, the Staffordshire Police and the Hampshire Constabulary. The Tayside Police in Scotland and the Dorset Police are also considering adopting the system. The national body responsible for police technology – the Police Information Technology Organisation (PITO, a part of the Home Office) – are considering adopting the forensic module of FLINTS as a national system accessible to every police officer in England, Wales and Scotland. The system was recommended as a “best practice” by two of Her Majesty’s Inspectors of Constabulary. The first, Keith Povey, afterward became Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector of Constabulary; the second is Sir David Blakey. See also Management Summary, Home Office Policing and Reducing Crime Unit (2001) Evaluation of the Impact of the FLINTS Software System in West Midlands and Elsewhere (Home Office, United Kingdom).
- 24.
It should be noted that the reference is plural. This is an important feature of the rationale and design behind the FLINTS approach. FLINTS manages evidence and information about volumes of crime as well as single crimes. The traditional approach is based on managing evidence and information as single cases.
- 25.
There are 43 police forces in England and Wales. These are distributed and resourced on the basis of political boundaries, with separate Chief Officers and Police Authorities. Each force decides its own policy for crime investigation, detection and reduction as well as the structural arrangements for the delivery of the policing service to the community. There is a natural tendency to concentrate on crime committed within the force’s boundaries, and crimes committed elsewhere attract less attention. This provides the strategic opportunity for criminals who are prepared to travel to commit crime with very little likelihood of being detected based on repetition of their offences. Criminals who reside in one police area and who travel to commit crime in other police areas are difficult to track and detect, and pose a serious threat to the community at large. Amongst other things, the National Criminal Intelligence Service (NCIS) was set up in 1996 to provide support to forces nationally in dealing with travelling criminals, yet no national system or ability to both monitor nominals (suspected persons), crimes they have links to, their associate networks and forensic evidence matches is capable of linking them with crimes and other persons. FLINTS could fill that gap.
- 26.
Forensic science and best practice is monitored jointly by a number of police and Forensic Science Service Regional User Boards. These operate across regional areas and serve a number of police forces. The Midland Region is served by boards for West Midlands, West Mercia, Staffordshire, and Warwickshire. It was chaired at the time by Mr. Peter Hampson, Chief constable of the West Mercia Police.
- 27.
The system is called Command and Control Data. This includes access to the emergency (999) system.
- 28.
Feedback loops involving an iterative process of hypothesis generation, testing and re-generation are limited. This type of process is important in the search for new knowledge in systems.
- 29.
Hampshire began using FLINTS in 2002, and as of April 2002, negotiations were underway to include Kent, Metropolitan Police, Tayside, South Wales, Dyfed Powys and Strathclyde. Two national Home Office projects, CRISP and VALLIANT, are studying the potential to link the databases of every police force. On 10 April 2002, the CRISP Project Team met with the West Midlands Police FLINTS Project Team, and subsequently reported that CRISP was considering using FLINTS as the central analytical tool for managing and interpreting the information.
- 30.
The term substance-blind evidence is borrowed from Schum (1994).
- 31.
DNA profiling has developed rapidly in recent years to become more and more sensitive and discriminating. The Forensic Science Service (FSS) can now offer a specialist service that has major implications for police investigating not just the most serious current crimes, but also those that happened decades ago. DNA Low Copy Number (DNA LCN) is an extension of the routine FSS SGM Plus™ profiling technique that enables scientists to produce DNA profiles from samples that contain very few cells, such as a single flake of dandruff or the residue left in a fingerprint. These profiles are fully compatible with those in the National DNA Database. DNA LCN profiles have been successfully generated from items such as discarded tools, matchsticks, nose and ear prints, weapon handles and ammunition casings in support of the FSS Major Crime Service. Given its high sensitivity, DNA LCN can be a particularly useful tool for investigating serious crimes when other profiling techniques have been exhausted or when options for forensic evidence appear to be limited. It can provide extremely valuable intelligence for Investigating Officers, but its context and interpretation need to be considered carefully. The relevance of a profile obtained through DNA LCN needs to be carefully considered, as it can offer valuable intelligence to police – but only within the framework of each individual case. DNA evidence, whether obtained through DNA LCN or another DNA SGN Plus™ technique, is always corroborative and its significance will always depend on what else is known about the suspect.
- 32.
Elderly people are chosen as victims on the premise that they may experience difficulties in the recollection of identity. More disturbing is the premise that they will not be able to survive cross-examination. In one extreme case, a criminal admitted to me that elderly witnesses, especially the very elderly, may not survive long enough to give evidence in court.
- 33.
This method is known as Low Copy Number DNA because it recovers small traces and then amplifies the trace material into sufficiently large samples for profiling. Another term for the procedure is supersensitive DNA.
- 34.
A typical technique is to visit the victim with false identification and claim to be a member of one of the public utilities. Once inside the premises, the offender has expertise in locating the victim’s cash savings. Many elderly victims do not use bank accounts. It is not unusual for several thousands of pounds to be stolen in cases of this sort. Many victims later die, but “proximity” in terms of causation of death is almost impossible to prove.
- 35.
Classified source.
- 36.
The idea to use Low Copy Number DNA to find small traces of DNA left at scenes was raised at a meeting of Crime Scene Examiners in 1999 in the West Midlands Region. The hypothesis was that use could be made of the technique providing that a location could be identified where the offender was known to have touched some part of the scene. This would greatly assist the swabbing process and enhance the likelihood of recovery of trace material for DNA profiling. A national operation called “Operation Liberal” employs similar forensic techniques to target and identify burglary offenders where elderly victims are involved.
- 37.
That is, a list of people who have been linked by evidence to crimes on more than one occasion.
- 38.
OCU is a police area called an Operational Command Unit.
- 39.
Police Forces use the term hit instead of match.
- 40.
The approach was made by Mr. Peter Hampson, QPM, Chief Constable, West Mercia Police, in February 2001.
- 41.
A substantial data set was being compiled to enter into FLINTS to establish the extent and weight of illegal drugs that reach markets and the magnitude of their people networks. A presentation of the findings to the Government was planned for Autumn 2001.
- 42.
Wigmore (1913, p. 149) dealt with “time and place” as a means of proof. “Proximity, on the part of the accused, as thus presented for consideration, may be, in itself, of various degrees, from mere vicinity, up to actual juxtaposition or contact. It may also be of various kinds, such as proximity to the person of the deceased, or to the scene of the crime, or both; and it may exist at different stages; as before the commission of the crime, or afterwards, or both before and after. The strongest form in which this circumstance can be presented, and the one which requires the least reasoning to give it effect, is undoubtedly that of the juxtaposition of the persons of the accused and deceased, proved, by actual observation to have existed both immediately before and immediately after the crime is perpetrated. These show presence at the moment of actual perpetration, with the greatest effect possible, short of direct evidence.”
- 43.
Schum (1994, p. 107) provides a detailed methodology for assessing the relative strengths and weaknesses inherent in testimonial evidence provided by an eyewitness. The methodology serves to illustrate how important it is for investigators to bear in mind the attributes of evidence and the way in which reliability has to be assessed and not merely accepted. Schum’s method is based on a non-statistical approach and involves asking a variety of questions about the behaviour of the witness relevant to assessing their credibility as well as other factors that might influence a person’s credibility. Schum believes that most credibility-related questions fall into three main classifications or, as he calls them, “major attributes”: veracity, objectivity and observational sensitivity. Let us assume that a witness “W” provides us with evidence that event “E” occurred. Let us further assume that the event did in fact take place and that “W” obtained evidence from his own senses causing “W” to believe that the event occurred – therefore, “W” knows that “E” occurred. We did not observe the event “E”, so how are we to verify the account given by “W”? Because “W” claims to have witnessed the event with his own senses, are we also to say we know that event “E” occurred? What we have really discovered is that “W” claims to know that event “E” occurred, not that event “E” actually did occur. In considering the testimony of “W” we are faced with a chain of inferences about what “W” believes, what “W” sensed and whether event “E” did occur. Schum demonstrates the decomposition of evidence when he tells us that we can also consider our own credibility in receiving the evidence from “W” because we are not passive in the receipt of evidence. If we question our own credibility, all we can really say is that we believe witness “W” told us that event “E” occurred. Let us examine this in detail to see what he means. In a diagram, one can see that “W” believes that “E” occurred based on the evidence of his senses, and this is depicted in the form of a chain of inferences. Each node in the chain indicates a point of uncertainty about what “W” tells us. If we include an assessment of our own ability to receive and convey the evidence of “W”, then the inferential chain becomes much longer. Not only must we consider veracity, objectivity and observational sensitivity in respect of witness “W”, we must also consider our own major attributes in the receipt and management of that evidence. This becomes increasingly important when dealing with evidence from questionable sources or when there are competing accounts of events from witnesses. Take, for example, intelligence sources where information is offered in return for favour or reward. The recruitment of intelligence sources from the criminal fraternity or from foreign countries for the receipt of intelligence should not be based simply on the ability of the source to provide information. A well-placed source in a criminal network of offenders or a foreign diplomat working as a defence attaché in a host country may well be in a position to provide timely, high-quality information. However, they may also be in a position to provide false or misleading information to undermine operations they have been recruited to oppose. Take, for example, a drug dealer providing the police with information. Though he may indeed have valuable information, he may also have a motive for “informing” on competing drug dealers who pose a threat to his own trade in illegal drugs. He may also provide the information to arrest many smaller drug dealers as a means of providing himself with a more open and exploitable market. In intelligence scenarios, a foreign source may provide valuable information about international negotiations concerning a new military capability. However, what is really being practised is a deception designed to distract attention away from new technology being developed in another area and that is of greater importance to that power. Schum (1994, p. 115) also provides a schematic diagram for depicting his classification of recurrent forms of evidence. He provides fifteen classifications.
- 44.
Evidence of motive is distinctly different from evidence of opportunity. One may have a motive to commit a crime, but that does not mean that the opportunity will present itself. Detectives sometimes mistake the two because motive and opportunity may on occasions converge, providing some additional probative force.
- 45.
The presence of X and Y chromosomes reveals that the genomic material comes from a man; the absence of a Y chromosome reveals that the donor was a woman. DNA markers used for criminal investigation routinely test for sex, but in my experience this eliminative test is not widely used despite its enormous value. For example, if a DNA profile is gained from material left at the scene of the crime, the gender test eliminates 50% of the suspect population from suspicion.
- 46.
The Command and Control System is simply the computer that manages information about incidents and crimes reported to or attended by police. It contains details of each incident and the officers attending, as well as brief report details and times.
- 47.
Sir Edward Crew, addressing a meeting of the Jill Dando Institute of Crime Science and the West Midlands senior management team.
- 48.
This area is a suburb of the West Midlands.
- 49.
Here, function simply means questions.
- 50.
In fact, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle was the son of Charles Doyle, who illustrated the book when it first appeared in book form, in 1888.
References
Peirce, C. S. [1901] (1955). Abduction and induction. In J. Buchler (Ed.), Philosophical writings of peirce (pp. 150–156). New York: Dover.
Schum, D. A. (1994). The evidential foundations of probabilistic reasoning. (Wiley Series in Systems Engineering.) New York: Wiley. Reprinted, Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press, 2001.
Wigmore, J. H. (1913). The problem of proof. Illinois Law Review, 8(2), 77–103.
Conan Doyle, A. (1987). See Doyle (1887).Footnote
In fact, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle was the son of Charles Doyle, who illustrated the book when it first appeared in book form, in 1888.
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Nissan, E. (2012). FLINTS, a Tool for Police Investigation and Intelligence Analysis: A project by Richard Leary explained by its author. In: Computer Applications for Handling Legal Evidence, Police Investigation and Case Argumentation. Law, Governance and Technology Series, vol 5. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-90-481-8990-8_7
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