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April 6, 2006 (Revised)

Forensic Document Laboratory (FDL)

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) Forensic Document Laboratory (FDL) provides a wide variety of forensic document analysis and operations support services to Department of Homeland Security (DHS) programs, as well as to other U.S. and foreign governmental entities, to combat travel and identity document fraud.

FDL SERVICES

Services and products provided by the FDL include the following:

  • Forensic examination of any documents, foreign or domestic;
  • Forensic examination of all disputed handwriting and hand printing;
  • Attempts to link multiple documents in one case through handwriting, stamp, and seal impressions, copy machines, or typewriters;
  • Processing evidence for latent fingerprints in an attempt to identify the person(s) who handled documents and ink-to-ink fingerprint comparisons;
  • Training and technical assistance in the detection of fraudulent documents;
  • Document intelligence Alerts and other operational intelligence products;
  • Assisting field officers via the Photophone and Image Storage and Retrieval System;
  • Managing the FDL Library; and
  • On-going liaison with other federal, state, local, and foreign government entities.

FDL ACCOMPLISHMENTS

In Fiscal Year 2005, the FDL Forensics Section received 4,180 submissions. This included 3,220 document examinations and 960 fingerprint examinations. FDL completed 3,918 outstanding cases in this same time period. In FY2005 the FDL Operations Section responded to 3,942 requests for assistance via telephone and email. The FDL also, produced and distributed 93 Document Intelligence products and trained 1668 students in fraudulent document recognition.

In fiscal year 2004, the Forensic Document Laboratory received 4,403 forensic cases for examination and completed a total of 5,672 forensic cases. Also last year, the Operations Section’s Intelligence Officers trained more than 2,094 students from within DHS and ICE, and other federal, state, and local law enforcement officers and foreign government officials in fraudulent document recognition. Also last year, the FDL responded to 7,748 requests for assistance via the Photophone and Image Storage and Retrieval System (ISRS), and produced 111 Document Intelligence Alerts.

Criminal cases represent approximately 20 percent of the FDL’s forensic casework. While the FDL doesn’t statistically track such outcomes as conviction rates for criminal cases, ICE does know that nearly all of those cases in which the FDL provides expert testimony result in either convictions or plea bargains based on the conclusions of our forensic analysis.

Even in administrative cases, most often the most persuasive “evidence” guiding the judge or magistrate is the FDL Report of Findings. And each case where ICE’s document examiners and intelligence officers assist requesters in determining the identity of an alien, or the validity of a document, demonstrates the critical value of the FDL in supporting ICE’s law enforcement mission.

CONTACTING THE ICE FORENSIC DOCUMENT LABORATORY

The FDL is staffed a 365 days a year, including all federal holidays. Hours of operation are Monday through Friday from 6 a.m. to 8:30 p.m. Eastern Time, and Saturday, Sunday, and all federal holidays from 10 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. Eastern Time.

Form M-396, "A Guide to Selected U.S. Travel and Identity Documents", is a booklet intended to assist law enforcement personnel to identify the various documents associated with travel, employment and identity. The 2005 Revision of this booklet was recently released. The updated version includes documents introduced by the Department of Homeland Security. Copies of the current booklet can be obtained through the National Distribution Center, by completing the following forms and faxing them to (317) 290-3046:

CF-3039 for federal government personnel
CF-262 for all other personnel

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) was established in March 2003 as the largest investigative arm of the Department of Homeland Security. ICE is comprised of five integrated divisions that form a 21st century law enforcement agency with broad responsibilities for a number of key homeland security priorities.


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