AFIS Success Stories

An 88-year-old female was murdered in her

home. The only information available to
authorities was that two males had been seen
in the area knocking on neighbors doors.
When the victims daughter found her mother,
the house was dark except for the bathroom
light. The toilet seat was up, and police noticed
a ngerprint on the toilet ush handle. They
submitted the handle to the laboratory. The
ngerprint was searched in AFIS and resulted
in a hit in less than 24 hours.
Peoria experienced a series of four bank
robberies. During a subsequent police lineup, a
bank teller identied a suspect. A holdup note
from one of the robberies was brought to the
laboratory for processing. Fingerprints were
developed and searched through AFIS. The
AFIS search resulted in a hit to a different
individual who turned out to be responsible
for all four robberies. The original suspect was
released from jail and cleared of all charges.
AFIS not only solves the crime being investigated,
but it can also solve other unresolved crimes.
After linking a suspect to a burglary scene
through AFIS, FIVE Rock Falls cases and TWO
Sterling cases were also solved.
After a ngerprint from a stolen vehicle was
searched through AFIS, a suspect was
identied and over 50 vehicle thefts in Illinois
and the city of St. Louis were solved.
After an AFIS hit led to a suspect charged with
home invasion, the arrest also cleared TWO
other home invasions, ONE aggravated battery,
and ONE robbery.
After an AFIS hit led to the arrest of a suspect
charged with a hotel burglary, the arrest
eventually cleared FIVE burglaries, THREE
robberies, and ONE auto theft.

1. Rockford Forensic Science Laboratory

200 South Wyman, Suite 400
Rockford, IL 61101
815/987-7419

2. Forensic Science Center at Chicago

1941 West Roosevelt
Chicago, IL 60608
312/433-8000

2
4

3. Westchester Forensic Science Laboratory

10001 West Roosevelt Road
Westchester, IL 60154
708-338-7800

4. Joliet Forensic Science Laboratory

515 East Woodruff Road
Joliet, IL 60432
815/740-3543

6, 7

5. Morton Forensic Science Laboratory

1810 South Main Street
Morton, IL 61550
309/284-6500

6. Springeld Forensic Science Laboratory

2040 Hill Meadows Drive
Springeld, IL 62702
217/782-4975
7. Research and Development Laboratory
2060 Hill Meadows Drive
Springeld, IL 62702
217/557-2399

8. Metro-East Forensic Science Laboratory

10023 Bunkum Road
Fairview Heights, IL 62208
618/394-6000
9. Southern Illinois Forensic Science Centre
606 East College Street
Carbondale, IL 62901
618/529-6500
Printed by the Authority of the State of Illinois
ISP Central Printing Section
ISP 6-630 (10/03) .5M

What is AFIS?
The Automated Fingerprint Identication System
(AFIS) is a computerized database of ngerprints
from known individuals and unknown latent
ngerprints from crime scenes. The Illinois
State Police (ISP) AFIS began operation in
1989. Fourteen years later, the ISP AFIS is a
continually growing database of more than 3.7
million ngerprint cards from known individuals.
These cards, called tenprint cards, are taken from
individuals for a variety of reasons - arrest,
licensing requirements, or background
checks. The tenprint cards are submitted to
the ISP Bureau of Identication.
The AFIS database also contains more
than 12,000 unidentied ngerprints left
at crime scenes and on items of evidence.
Using AFIS, ISP forensic scientists
compare a ngerprint found at a crime
scene to the millions of known ngerprints in
the database to identify a suspect (a hit) in
a matter of hours. Before AFIS, this task would
have taken many years to accomplish.

1989-2003*

Cases
Searched

Case
Hits

Case Hit
Rate

21,407

6,065

28.33%

AFIS Case Hits

1989-2003*

207

94 65
97
64
104

548

48 4

*Through April 30, 2003

608

Burglary

Robbery

Homicide

Theft

Arson

Assault

Forgery

Other

Auto Theft
Home
Invasion
Sexual
Assault

* Through April 30, 2003

Cases Searched - Number of criminal cases in

which AFIS was used to assist the investigation.
Case Hits - Number of cases which resulted in an
AFIS hit.
Case Hit Rate - Percentage of cases searched
which resulted in an AFIS hit.

How does AFIS work to solve

crimes?
Police collect a suspicious ngerprint as
evidence of a crime and submit it to the Latent
Print Section of an ISP Forensic Science
Laboratory.
If it is suitable for comparison, the latent print
is compared to the tenprint cards in the case.
These cards could be from a person the police
believe may be a suspect, from the victim, or
from other persons whose ngerprints may
legitimately be at the scene.
If the evidence ngerprint does not match
those on the tenprint cards and is of sufcient
quality, it can be entered into AFIS, where
it is compared with all the tenprint cards
in the database housed at the Bureau of
Identication.

529

AFIS Statistics
Year

AFIS identies an average of one to

two suspects each working day.

Since many criminals are repeat offenders,

an AFIS hit on one case can identify a
criminal before he/she has a chance of
committing
additional crimes.

The AFIS computer generates a list of

candidates whose known ngerprints bear
similarities to the evidence ngerprint being
searched. The forensic scientist evaluates the
AFIS candidate list and compares these prints
to determine if they match.
The forensic scientist then makes a direct
comparison between the actual evidence
ngerprint and the tenprint card bearing the
most similarities to determine if they match.
If they match, the suspect is identied. This is
considered an AFIS hit.
If no hit is made, the evidence ngerprint
is entered into AFISs latent print database
and compared against other unsolved cases.
Since these databases are constantly being
compared, AFIS can solve a crime which
occurred years ago.