How A Document Examiner Can Assist Your Client

Despite the much-vaunted "electronic, paperless office," documents play a significant role in many legal cases and many attorneys try to find an expert witness with this expertise. Resolution of a case often hinges on the veracity of a document. We think of a document first as being piece of paper, but actually a "document" might be a gym locker (sprayed with graffiti), a credit card (potentially counterfeit), or a book jacket (with a questioned inscription).



When a document problem becomes a pivotal issue in a case, questions that arise can often be answered by a document examiner. Although handwriting identification is the greatest part of the practice of most private document examiners, there is much more than "Who wrote it?" to be learned from documents with the assistance of specially designed laboratory equipment.



Perhaps your client opens his or her bank statement to find that a check was cleared through the bank in the amount of $14,000. Your client insists that s/he wrote the check for four thousand dollars. It may be possible to show, with an infrared image analyzer, that a "1" was inserted before the "4" and that "teen" was added to the word "four". Infrared light is focused on the original document, and if different inks are present, they may differ in their ability to reflect the infrared wavelengths. With the right lighting, filtering and photographic equipment, these differences can be seen and photographed, resulting in indisputable proof of alteration of the document. The logical next question might be, "Are two handwritings involved?" which is an age-old question for the document examiner.



Maybe your client was in an accident, and the official report contains an obliteration that might be significant. The same method described above might reveal what was originally written. Or, if your client receives an anonymous letter, there may be clues to identify the author hidden in indentations on the document. With either the right lighting or an electrostatic detection apparatus, indentations can be revealed and photographed.



Should your client’s case involve a multi-page document, you might have cause to wonder whether the entire document was prepared at one time, whether the document was prepared at the time alleged, or whether page substitutions have been made. When journal entries or medical records are involved, timing might again be an issue.



These are all questions that can be addressed by the document examiner. In order to answer any of these questions, it is important that the evidence that is on the documents be preserved in the best condition possible. Original documents are always best evidence and many of the technical questions described here can only be answered from originals. There are, however, situations where photocopies are at issue, or only copies are available. Depending on the situation, answers can frequently be obtained.



You can ensure the highest possible degree of success by properly caring for your questioned documents. Keep them in archivally-safe plastic covers away from light and humidity. Do not add any staples or folds to the document. It is best not to refold documents, especially if there is any writing across the folds. Be careful that you do not put the document in an envelope and then write on the envelope, or put another document on top of the questioned document and write on it. It would be embarrassing if those indentations on the questioned document turned out to be your grocery list or notes you took during a phone conversation.



Once a document examiner finds the answer to your question, the next part of the job is to report the findings and possible to testify in a court proceeding. Demonstrative evidence is usually the most convincing evidence. Newly developed equipment assists the document examiner in making the clearest presentation of the evidence. It is now possible to link a stereomicroscope to a computer so that fine details can be captured and shown to the trier(s)-of-fact in print, on a monitor, or on videotape.



Today’s equipment is also more portable. It is possible to examine a document and capture the evidence to back up a report or testimony in your office or at the clerk’s office where original documents often reside.



Even with the many advances in technology, there are still document questions that are difficult, if not impossible, to answer. One very challenging question involves "sequence of lines." For example, you may want to know whether a bank stamp appears under or on top of an endorsement signature. What makes this a hard question to answer is that different colors and compositions of ink can react with each other to produce optical illusions. A dark ink may look like it is on top of a lighter ink even if it is not. If the inks have different reflective properties or if the writing instrument formed indentations there are more likely to be visual clues that will allow a reliable answer to the question.



Another document question that can not easily be answered is, "On what date was the document actually signed/prepared?" An ink chemist can give relative dating information in many cases, (which of two inks has been on the paper longer, for example), but even ink chemistry fails to produce absolute dating information (e.g. "This document was signed on June 4, 1993").



Right now technology is a useful tool and a boon to the document examiner. It will be interesting to see how the profession will be affected by technological advances in the next 20 to 50 years. Will better tools expand the capabilities of the document examiner, or will handwriting, signatures, and paper documents fall away as the predominant method of personal identification and commitment, eventually eliminating the practice of document examination as we know it? Only time will tell. As for today, there is a lot that the document examiner can do to resolve document questions for you and your client.



Emily Will, CDE, Board Certified Document Examiner



[You can view My Profile and find an expert witness at X-Pro, the innovative expert witness directory]