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Scientific Method

Many courts today hold the Daubert application to expert scientific testimony. The court is more likely to accept fingerprint evidence as reliable when the latent print examiner's testimony includes a precise description of the application of ACE-V Methodology as being derived by, or analogous to, the Scientific Method. Testimony should describe the use of ACE-V methodology as based upon sound scientific principles (i.e.: Quality Assurance, Standards & Controls). If challenged to demonstrate this, the latent print examiner should testify that the examination which resulted in the individualization embodied the Principle Steps of the Scientific Method (given below).

The Scientific Method is a basic structure of inquiry used to fully understand the nature, characteristics and scope of a problem or an issue. It is applied as a research project, and its undertaking is an attempt to fully comprehend the possible outcomes, stengths, weaknesses, objectivity, reliability and error rates behind the study of a phenomenom. Since the Scientific Method is the standard used across the many different branches of science for their research, the conclusions derived by the Scientific Method are often widely accepted as embracing sound scientific principles and procedures.

Principal Steps of the Scientific Method:

1. Observation & Description
   
2. Proposal of a Tentative Hypothesis
   
3. Prediction of the Results of Testing
   
4. Experimentation to Test the Hypothesis
   
5. Conclusions / Validating the Hypothesis