A brief history of handwriting examination

Introduction

Forensic document examination has been
around for many decades, especially when people and courts have
faced the problems of authenticating seals,handwriting, hand-
printing and overall questioned document problems. It was not
until the later part of the 18th century that scientific
examination of questioned documents began to take serious
roots.

Historical
Data

Since the beginning of civilization,
forgers have been hard at work deceiving people by imitating the
writings of others. When an Egyptian pharoah first fashioned a
seal to identify the royal house, a forger would melt, alter and
reseal.1

The earliest handwriting examination cases
reported goes back to the third century A.D.

In imperial Rome, where it was common
practice to fraudulently prepare official documents. Rome
personages such as Titus and Anthony made large profits in
pre-

paring forgeries of all types of documents
related to property rights. It is said that Titus,
was "the most skillful forger of his time."2

From all historical accounts, it was
mandated under Roman Law that procedures for detection of forgery
be implemented. During the sixth century, the Roman
Emperor Justinian dictated guidelines for the use of
handwriting comparisons in Roman courts.

Here, the presiding judge through his
discretionary powers appointed individuals in the
community with special skill in writing to perform an
examination of questioned writing and give testimony
to it"s autenticity. It must be pointed out that no scientific
methods were employed because the comparisons of the writings
were on "likeness" or similarity of the writing
itself.3

As the years passed, European countries
accepted and practiced the Justinian rule on handwriting
comparisons.4

In Spain, public servants were appointed by
Alfonso X the Sage as "Omes Sabidores," to detect
forged documents by using formal scientific
deduction.5

In France, experts were designated by royal
decree as "Master Writers."6

With the invention of photography, a few
photographers in the 1890's fancied them- selves as document
examiners because photographs could be enlarged, a novelty in
those days, that gave them the opportunity of visually studying
minute details on handwriting, handprinting that composed
extended writings and signatures.7

In a famous public document case, a
frenchman by the name of Alphonse Bertillon, who was the inventor
of anthropometry and a fancy photographer gave damaging
testimony again an army officer by the name of
Dreyfus by pinpointing him as the person who pre- an
incriminating document. It wasn"t until years later while Dreyfus
was in jail that Bertillon"s mistaken opinion was challenged by
well known and established forensic document examiners in England
and the United States. With new evidence introduced, Dreyfus was
finally exonerated of the charges of treason.8

The Scientific
Era of Document Examination

During the 1890's, handwriting
identification in the United States began to take root when
scientific methods and techniques were introduced. (The forensic
document examiner now applies in his daily work the
use of microscopy, chemistry, laboratory
instrumentation and digital photography). Many spurious
documents have been exposed through the years with this forensic
and practical science).9

In 1910, pioneer Albert Sherman Osborn
published his first edition of "Questioned
Documents." Before Obsorn, books on the identification of
handwriting were in print.

(Authors such as Hagen, Frazer, Ames and
others), but when the publication "Questioned
Documents" was first published with it"s revised edition in 1929,
it became the cornerstone of questioned document examination in
the United States with the help of John Wigmore, author of "Legal
Evidence." Although writing instruments, inks, paper, typewriting
including techniques and procedures have changed greatly due to
scientific advancements, some of the principles and techniques is
still practiced by forensic document examiners today.

First Crime
Laboratory in Puerto Rico

Forensic document examination in Puerto
Rico before 1948 was non existent. It was the Commonwealth Police
Department that created the first crime laboratory located at
Stop 3, in Old San Juan and later moved to Barbosa Avenue in Hato
Rey. Years later the laboratory was moved again, and this time to
the Department of Police headquarters on Roosevelt Avenue, Hato
Rey, Puerto Rico.10

From personal interviews, Dr. Arnaldo
Palmer, a police department physician was one of the first crime
laboratory directors, who supervised the already established
Photo-graphy, Chemistry, Fingerprints and Questioned Document
sections. Most of the laboratory personnel were civilians.?For
more than 28 years, Rafael Viñas Negrón headed the
document section until his retirement in the 60's. Others that
followed in Viñas shoes was Eugenio Roman, Saul Rivera and
Edgardo Flores Crespo.11

Also in the 60's, the document section of
the police department began to expand when the crime laboratory
recruited new personnel headed now by Angel Figueroa Vivas who
later became an attorney to head the newly formed Special
Investigations Bureau of the Commonwealth Department of
Justice.

It"s fair to mention that amoung the
personnel at the crime laboratory who was versed in
criminalistics including document examination was Dr. Israel
Castellanos, a Cuban exile, who was a medical doctor by
profession and an avid crime fighter in the Sherlock Homes
tradition. (Dr. Castellanos was one of the three founders of the
American Academy of Forensic Sciences in the United
States.

During the 20's and 30's, document
examiners from the mainland visited Puerto Rico to do document
work and testify in local and the Federal District Court of San
Juan.

(In Osborn"s book, "Questioned Documents",
he intervened in a disputed ballot case involving check marks as
reported in the case of Ryan vs. Strate, 10 O.C. Reports, New
Style, 497; 87 N.E. 1141 (1908). Also, it is noteworthy to
mention that in 1989, in San Juan, Puerto Rico, a similar case in
Granados Navedo vs. Rodriguez Estrada, CA-89-54 involved
15 mayoralty ballots were in dispute).

In this case as well as others, I has the
privilege of examining the questioned cross marks and it revealed
that they were possibly made by the same person. To strengthen
the opinion, John McCarty, a recognized document examiner from
Florida, was called into the case and John also concluded that
the ballots could have been made by one person, but we couldn"t
identify the person who made the check marks.

Besides Osborn, I want to mention Dr.
Rafael Ruénes Fernández from Miami, who was a Cuban
refugee and one of the founders of the American Society of
Questioned Document Examiners, who travelled to Puerto Rico to do
questioned document examinations. Dr. Ruénes who I
befriended, wrote many technical papers in the field of
questioned documents including a book titled, "Examen de
Documentos Dubitados:

Peritaje Caligráfico or Examination
of Questioned Documents and Handwriting Expert," a 1951
publication and dedicated to his teacher Albert S. Osborn. It was
Ruénes who introduced the scientific principles of
document examination in the courts of Puerto Rico in Spanish and
the different opinions when the evidence did not meet the
criterias of a positive identification of authorship in a
questioned document case.13

The Second
Forensic Crime Laboratory in Puerto Rico

In 1978, the Commonwealth Department of
Justice Special Investigations Bureau (SIB), was
created by Public Law 38, establishing the second forensic
laboratory on the island. It was the responsibility of Juan Julio
Roman, a Forensic Scientist, as its first Forensic Director to
set up shop with state of the art scientific instrument and
personnel. Nearly one million dollars of public funds was spent
in laboratory instruments along.14

Looking back over the years gone by, the
small and effective crime laboratory consisted of the following
sections: Chemistry, Firearms, Polygraph, Photography,
Fingerprints, Questioned Documents, Research and Communications.
The forensic personnel was madeup of Juan Julio Roman, Director,
Edwin Medina, Asst. Director, Pedro Nelson Acosta, Photographer
and Fingerprint technician, Orlando Plá Ortiz,
Polygrapher, Ruben Meléndez, Chemist, Guillermo
López, Chemist, Rafael Viñas Torres, Questioned
Document Examiner, Anibal González, Firearms Examiner,
Orlando Díaz Chemist and Nemías Vélez,
Assistant Photographer and Communication technician.

In 1982, This author replaced Rafael
Viñas Torres, son of Rafael Viñas Negrón,
who opted to go into private practice with his father who retired
as document examiner of the Commonweath Department of Police. No
sooner that I was assigned to the document section, I was sent to
the F.B.I and Secret Service Schools in Quantico,Virginia,
Glenco, Georgia to receive instructions in the questioned
document field.

In 1983, for "hands on experience", I
trained for a short period of time at the San Bruno Crime
Laboratory of the Postal Inspection Service and at the Fraud
Detail Section of the San Francisco Police, California
U.S.A.

Many of the instructors at the F.B.I. and
Secret Service Schools were Dale Moreau, Irby Todd, John Haggett
and Ronald Dick. At the San Bruno Lab, Susan Morton and George
Lewis. At the Fraud Detail Section, my friend Lloyd Cunningham.
Later, I corresponded frequently with Rafael Ruénes
Fernández of the Miami Dale Police as my
advisor.

In the 80"s, the document section was
increasingly experiencing all kinds of document examinations that
included alterations, obliteration, machine copies, rubber
stamps, as well as handwriting, handprinting and numbers in
questionable documents.

High Profile
Document Cases in Puerto Rico

Some high profile case brought to the
attention of the public was State v. Ivan Ortiz Torres, Superior
Ct., criminal case no. 685-3168, where a state legislator was the
among the first house members to be indicted and convicted of
falsification of checks.

Other important profile cases involved an
individual who tried to extort a large amount of money from the
president of one of the island"s mayor newspaper "El Nuevo
Día," who was the son of a former governor of Puerto Rico.
(State vs. Carlos Burgos et als,

Superior Ct., criminal case no.
683-44-441). The other case involved the State Lottery

Agency where a check in the amount of half
million dollars was prepared fraudulently and cashed at a local
bank.15

Laboratory
Scientific Instruments

Much of the work in questioned document
examination was conducted with modern scientific instruments such
as the estereomicroscope, the electrostatic
indentation

Apparatus (ESDA), an instrument that
detects latent writings, marks and impressions of fingerprints
and palm prints in paper, Infrarred and Ultraviolet Video Imaging
System, typewriter measure plates, photographic equipment and
chemical reagents.16

Merger of Two
Forensic Laboratories and Institute of Legal
Medicine

In 1984, Attorney Hector Rivera Cruz,
Former Secretary of Justice, created a law to merge the two state
forensic laboratories and the Institute of Legal Medicine into
one agency. (The idea was founded when the Secretary of Justice
visited the Institute of Forensic Sciences in Dallas, Texas
headed by Dr. Irving Stone, Director, and how the Institute
Operated. (Dr. Stone was the expert witness in the murders of two
young men by the the Commonwealth Department of Police in the
Cerro Maravilla Case).17

In 1985, the state legislature approved
Public Law 13, creating the Puerto Rico Institute Of Forensic
Sciences. To head the direction of the forensic institute, the
Secretary of Justice named Dr. Pío Rechani López, a
chemistry professor of the University of Puerto Rico as Executive
Director. Under his supervision, personnel of the three
government agencies (Police, SIB and the Institute of Legal
Medicine merged as one, forming the Puerto Rico Institute of
Forensic Sciences). Today, the questioned document section of the
Puerto Rico Institute of Forensic Sciences and its personnel are
certified by the Laboratory Accreditation Board of the American
Society of Crime Laboratory Directors.

Conclusion

For more than a century, questioned
document examination in Europe, United States, Latin America and
Puerto Rico has come a long way from those earlier days, when
examiners did not have the best of training and equipment. In the
words of Ordway Hilton, "future document examiners must always
keep in mind that, we cannot stand still, there is much progress
and history still to be made".18

Bibliographic

1.Times, "Hilter"s Forged Diaries," May 16,
1983, p.36.

2. Baker, Newton, "Law of Disputed and
Forged Documents, "The Michie Company, 1955,
pp.1-11.

3. Ibid.

4. Ruenes, Rafael F., "Examen de Documentos
Dubitados Peritaje Caligrafico", 1951,
pp.611-625.

5. Moenssens, Andre & Inbau,
"Scientific Evidence in Criminal Cases," The
Foundation Press, 2nd Ed., 1978, pp.463-464.

6. Ibid.

7. Hilton, Ordway, "History of Questioned
Document Examination in the United States," paper
presented at the Society of Forensic Questioned
Document

Examiners, March 22, 1977.

8. Personal interview with Edwin Medina,
Forensic Scientist at the Puerto Rico Institute of
Forensic Sciences, July 14, 1991.

9. Ibid.

10. Personal interview with Juan Julio
Román, Forensic Scientist at the Puerto Rico
Institute of Forensic Sciences, August 13, 1991.

11. Ibid.

12. Osborn, Albert S., "Questioned
Documents," Paterson Smith, 2nd Ed. 9th printing,
1978, p. 320.

13. Personal interview by phone with Dr.
Rafael Fernández Ruénes, Miami,
Florida, June 18, 1984.

14. Public Law 38, approved July 21, 1978,
creating the Special Investigation Bureau of the
Commonwealth of Puerto Rico.

15. Public Law 13, approved July 24, 1985,
creating the P.R. Institute of Forensic
Sciences.

16. Ibid

17. Ibid

18. Hilton, Ordway, "History of Questioned
Document Examination in the United States," paper
presented at the Society of Forensic Questioned
Document

Examiners, March 22, 1977.

Author:

Evaristo Alvarez
Ghigliotti

*Conference professor, University of
Turabo. BS, John Jay College of Criminal

Justice, New York 1968. MA, Interamerican
University, San Juan,P.R., 1979.

LL.B LaSalle Extension University Law
School, Chicago, III., 1968. Author of

"Forensic Investigation of Documents: It"s
Historical, Technical and Legal Aspects",

4th Ed., 2012. Principal editor of the
publication "El Examinador Forense de P.R.".