What You Don’t Know Can’t Hurt You
Suspects undergoing Brain Fingerprinting are given targets, probes, and irrelevants to determine the existence of what neuroscientist Lawrence Farwell calls a P300 MERMER (Memory and Encoding Related Multi-facet Electronic Response) brain response.
The technology requires subjects to be monitored by a computer as they receive stimuli, such as targets of what investigators have told suspects about a crime, probes about what only the actual suspects would know, and irrelevant data that is similar to the crime but is not related.
Judging the P300 MERMER response to both probes and irrelevant data will determine if a suspect has knowledge of the crime that would not be possible unless the suspect is the perpetrator or witnessed the crime, says Farwell.
Another application for the technology is to determine if an individual has any association with a group of people, explains retired FBI veteran Drew Richardson.
Brain Fingerprinting is a mostly unknown technology that is admissible in up to 75 percent of court cases, while most physical DNA and fingerprint evidence is often deemed not admissible in court cases. Although Brain Fingerprinting does not prove guilt or innocence, it does prove if a suspect has inside knowledge of a crime.
Abstracted by the National Law Enforcement and Corrections Technology Center(NLECTC) from the Law Enforcement Technology (09/05) Vol. 32, No. 9, P. 94; Simon, Sam .
