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How Much Can a Forensic Laboratory Do to Discriminate Questioned Ink Entries?
Author(s) -
Sun Qiran,
Luo Yiwen,
Zhang Qinghua,
Yang Xu,
Xu Che
Publication year - 2016
Publication title -
journal of forensic sciences
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.715
H-Index - 96
eISSN - 1556-4029
pISSN - 0022-1198
DOI - 10.1111/1556-4029.13067
Subject(s) - inkwell , forensic examination , identification (biology) , chromatography , materials science , computer science , chemistry , forensic engineering , engineering , composite material , biology , botany
Questioned document examiners are frequently required to determine whether the questioned ink entries on a document are written with the same ink, either for forged document identification or relative ink dating. How many methods are sufficient to discriminate potentially different inks? In this paper, 18 blue ballpoint inks were first nondestructively examined with a video spectral comparator. The ink entries were subsequently extracted with organic solvents for analysis of the volatile solvents and dyes by GC/MS, TLC, and LC‐MS/MS. The 18 ink samples were divided into 10, 9, 12, and 14 categories by these four methods, respectively. With the combined results, there were only two inks that remained indistinguishable, but they were further differentiated by microscopy. Therefore, to achieve effective discrimination of ballpoint ink entries, the authors suggest that a complete examination should include an analysis of their optical features, volatile solvents, and dyes as well as the ink quality.