Dual Recovery of DNA and Fingerprints using Minitapes

Touch DNA and fingerprints are usually found on many items at crime scenes; thus, they are a powerful type of evidence to help investigators to link suspects to crimes committed. Dual recovery of Touch DNA and fingerprints has been previously investigated and proven to be challenging, therefore this study examined the possibility of collecting Touch DNA before fingerprint collection using Scene Safe FAST minitapes. The recovery of Touch DNA from the deposited fingerprints with minitapes (MT) was successful with all the collected samples producing full DNA profiles. Furthermore, the recovery of fingerprints was 90% successful from glass and 100% from stainless steel, with fingerprint recovery not impacted by the collection of DNA or the number of minitape lifts (p < 0.05)