I remember a cop taking information, not fingerprints.
Out of the hundreds of larceny from home/auto calls to which I responded as a patrol officer, nearly all of the victims wanted dusting for fingerprints---and in nearly all of those cases, I refused to request crime scene to do so.
Gathering evidence is one of the many ways that the average person has gotten an incorrect idea on how police work actually works by watching television. Because of C.S.I. and its spin-offs, along with later modern cop shows, many victims of break-ins believe that, once the crime scene techs are called in, they'll pull out their microscopes and fingerprint dust, gather the forensic evidence, and---poof!---the police will identify the crooks and get their stuff back in sixty minutes. It's called "the C.S.I. effect".
Here are the real-world facts. In 80-90% of house and auto break-ins/larcenies, the perpetrator(s) leave behind no evidence of forensic value. That includes fingerprints---and, no, it's not because the crooks always wear gloves.
How many people have been in your home? Friends, relatives, salesmen, repairmen, deliverymen . . . and they all leave fingerprints behind. That means if the crook(s) left fingerprints, they're going to be mingled with the prints of everyone else who's been in your home. Sure, the crime techs can eliminate your prints and those of any roommates. But can you provide the name of every person who's been in your home over the last six months? Can you even remember all of the people who've been in your home over the last six months?
And the same goes for your car. You might insist that only you have been in your car over the last six months, but are you sure? And what about if you'd had your car serviced? Those folks would've handled something inside your car, too.
O.K., one might think . . . so the crime scene tech collects a dozen different sets of prints. After he eliminates yours, can't he run the others through the super-scientific computerised local, state, and Federal data bases? Sure, but that doesn't necesarily lead to a hit identifying a set of prints with those whose prints are on record because of arrest. Or, conversely, four or tive hits might come back. Just because a person has an arrest record doesn't positively identify him as the one who broke into your house or car. Not by itself, that is---and I'll get to that in a moment. The painful fact is, in the vast majority of cases, the collexion of fingerprints at the scene of a break-in produces no usable resutts;
There's one signficant departure from that, and the experienced patrol cop knows to look for it. If an event or item can be definitvely connected with the break-in/larceny, then the cop will call in the crime scene techs. For example, if the burglar forced the lock of a sliding glass door, or cut the screen and reached through to handle it, the metal of the door may contain prints that definitively point to the crook. (Presumably, any of your friends, relatives, salesmen, or repairmen didn't break in through the sliding glass door.) A forced window may also contain valuable prints for the same reason. A forced door, like your front door, will probably not---because the crook kicked it in, or smashed it in with his shoulder.
A great deal depends on what the responding patrol cop observes at the scene. I remember one case, in which the family was gone for a week's vacation. When they returned, they discovered that vandals had broken into their house and, besides what they took, they tore the place apart. They destroyed furniture, smashed the television set, and took items such as flour out of the pantry and dumped it all over the kitchen. Ordinarily, there would've been no hope to obtain usable prints---except for one thing which I noticed. On the mantle of their fireplace stood an anniversary clock---you know, the kind in which the timepiece sits under a glass dome. For some reason, the invaders hadn't bothered to take it---but it had gotten their interest. I observed that there were ten clear, fresh fingerprints, from five fingers on each side of the glass dome. One of these Napoleons of crime had lifted the globe up to take a look at the clock inside, then, for whatever reason, decided it wasn't worth taking. I called crime scene for that one, and the prints were taken. Even more fortunately, they were matched up to one of local troublemakers who'd been in and out of the local jail. Because he could be positively identified as one who'd been in the house, the detectives were able to get him to talk, and the whole Hee Haw gang of lowlifes got a trip to the hoosegow.
Another break-out situation where it makes sense to dust for prints is if, say, upon fleeing, the crook drops your CD player on your back lawn. When you have something like that, if the surface of the dropped item will retain fingerprints, then the patrol cop will, indeed, call crime scene to dust it. Because, outside of your prints, the only other prints on the item will be the crook who dropped it. I once got called to a larceny of auto. After taking the account from the victim, I inspected his car. The crook had gained access by smashing the window of the passenger front door. The radio had been yanked out. The glove compartment had been forced open and the contents strewn across the front seat. There was nothing to be gained by dusting the car or its interior for prints. As I was explaining this to the victim and his family, the victim's adult son came into the house, holding an licence plate in both hands.
"I forgot to tell you," he said. "We kept this old plate in the back seat of the car, and I found it in the driveway. Can you get the crook's fingerprints from this?"
I looked at him, holding the metal plate with all ten fingers all over it.
"Not anymore," I told him. If he'd just left it where he found it, then it probably would've produced worthwhile print and photo evidence.
Often the victim would argue with me when I refused to call crime scene. "Then call your supervisor," he'd insist. "If you want to speak to him," I'd respond, "you can call him yourself." (For some reason, many citizens believe if they demand the patrol officer call his supervisor then he has to do it.) On the occasions when the victim did contact the supervisor, once I explained that the condtions of the break-in did not allow for usable fingerprints, the supervisor always backed me up.
Now, wait a minute, commander . . . even if there's a 80-90% likelihood that the perpetrator(s) left no usable prints behind, what if I'm in that 10-20%? Shouldn't you call for crime scene just in case?
No. That's because crime scene resources are limited. There are only so many crime scene techs working at any given time, and I worked in a city of almost 700,000 citzens. If I call you to a house break-in on a 10% chance, that means tying up a crime scene tech for an hour (or longer, if it's a case of total vandalism like the house I described above). That means a crime scene tech that isn't available if a homicide or a shooting or an armed store hold-up goes down. There were always more of those in one evening in my city than there were available crime scene techs working, so crime scene was always undermanned, even if they weren't bothered by requests that had little chance of producing usable evidence. It's unpleasant, but the police have to prioritise their assets.
I understand, the math is difficult. When your home has been invaded, your personal property searched, and your valuables taken, it's a major event in your life. It's the most important thing in the world. But, relatively, there are much worse crimes going down at or around the same time, and they have to take precedence. No cop wants to tell the loved one of someone who's just been gunned down in a hold-up that he has to wait for crime scene because they're out at a larceny from auto working with no real chance to get evidence.
I remember an occasion when my division had just had a new captain assigned, and she put out the word that patrol officers must call crime scene for all home and auto break-ins. It was partly public relations, but to be fair, also due to fall-out from the top brass. We had just gotten a new chief of police, and he didn't trust the experience or discretion of patrol officers or their sergeants. After that, I must've called crime scene four or five times a week on larcenies from home/auto that I knew full well did not have usable prints or other evidence. I uncomfortably had to apologise to the techs when they arrived---because they knew that I knew better.
After about two months, somebody must've talked to somebody, because the captain lifted the always-call-crime-scene requirement.
As for the attitude of the police, especially in your circumstance, Cap, I can't necessarily alibi it. As in every other position in life, there are bad cops and lazy cops and cops who've burnt out and just don't care, anymore. I can't say that you didn't get one of those, Cap, and if you did, I apologise. But there's also another syndrome in play here---one that I, unfortunately, fell into too often. You said you suffered one burglary in your life. To you, that was massive. It hit hard. You felt violated and outraged in a way never before or since.
For you, it was one time. But a patrol cop investigates a dozen or more of these a week. For even a dedicated, experienced cop who investigates properly, it's routine to him, including the emotional state of the victims. It gets difficult to put the victim's feelings into perspective. I can recall several instances where I was investigating a case where the apartment of a single, young female had been burglarised. Many times, these girls showed not just irritation or anger at being victimised, but outright fear; and they would declare that they had to spend the night with someone else in case the crook came back. I never said this out loud---I always said the right, comforting things---but every time I'd be thinking, "Why would he come back? He's already got all your stuff." Because, in truth, in all my time as a cop, I'd never experienced or even heard of a case where the crook came back to the same home in the same night. Because it's difficult (not a justification; just stating the fact of it) that it's hard for a cop who's gone through God-knows-how-many burglary investigations to remember that, sure, it's another day at work for him, but a life-changing event for the victim.
I hope that explains some of the behind-the-scenes things that go on when something like this happens to you and others.
.
ClarkKent_DC > Commander BensonJune 23, 2026 at 12:01am
Commander Benson said:
O.K., one might think . . . so the crime scene tech collects a dozen different sets of prints. After he eliminates yours, can't he run the others through the super-scientific computerised local, state, and Federal data bases? Sure, but that doesn't necesarily lead to a hit identifying a set of prints with those whose prints are on record because of arrest. Or, conversely, four or tive hits might come back. Just because a person has an arrest record doesn't positively identify him as the one who broke into your house or car. Not by itself, that is---and I'll get to that in a moment. The painful fact is, in the vast majority of cases, the collexion of fingerprints at the scene of a break-in produces no usable resutts;
Obviously, Commander, you have more real-world experience with this kind of thing than I do, at least on the investigative side of such circumstances. All of my knowledge on that score comes from those cop shows I don't watch any more and reading crime fiction, especially Ed McBain's 87th Precinct novels and stories.
At least McBain took pains to be more accurate than most. Indeed, many of his novels went into exhaustive detail about forensics three decades before CSI: Crime Scene Investigation and its spinoffs and clones came into vogue. One I remember vividly described the different types of fingerprints as the Isola Police Department's CSI went to work. There are fingerprints left on hard, smooth surfaces from the oils and sweat from a person's hands; fingerprints left when the person touches a somewhat soft, malleable surface, like wax; and fingerprints fransferred when the person first touches something that leaves a stain, like paint, ink or shoe polish.
That doesn't mean that every surface yields a usable print. I used to be a devotee of Joseph Wambaugh's work, too; as a detective with the Los Angeles Police Department turned novelist, he also was more accurate than most. (Sometimes Wambaugh and McBain would try a little too hard to show their homework, so to speak.) I rermember a bit in one of Wambaugh's novels which a detective picked up a brick to toss through a window for some reason, and wiped it on his pants beforehand. His partner, incredulous, shouted at him, "What are you doing? You can't get lifts off a freakin' brick!"
We might note that running any prints one might gather through "the super-scientific computerised local, state, and Federal data bases" may be a waste of time also because your investigator may be trying to find a two-bit burglar from the millions upon millions of fingerprint records of arrestees, police officers, suspected terrorists, federal workers and members of the military services ... and the effort won't flag anyone who isn't in any of those categories.
On the other hand, sadly, I do have real-world experience on the other side of the equation, as a crime victim. Many years ago, when I lived in Florida, I got up in the morning and opened my door to find my car had been stolen. It was the first (and only) brand-new car I had ever owned, a gray Mazda 323. We discerned that the thief or thieves had punched out the lock on the driver's side door and probably hot-wired the car and drove it away while we slept; I found the lock in the grass. Stupidly, although I should have known better from reading all those McBain stories, I picked it up to give to the uniformed investigating officer who dutiflly took the report. I didn't really expect him to dust it for fingerprints, but I still shouldn't have.
Fortunately, I did get my car back; it was found about a mile away in a trailer park. Unfortunately, the thieves took it there to remove the alloy rims that came with the car; we found it resting on concrete blocks with all four wheels gone. Worse, the crooks gouged vicious things into the paint and stole a camera from the glove compartment and my toolbox from the trunk.
I can say that the uniformed officer who arrived was professional and probably competent. I say "probably" because the car wasn't recovered through any effort from the police. The trailer park somehow got my address, probably through my license plates, and sent me a letter telling me where the car was and asking me to retrieve it.
In the end, my auto insurance made me whole, paying for a new paint job and replacing the wheels and tires, although with basic ones, not the fancier ones that must have attracted the attention of the thieves.
JD DeLuzio > Commander BensonJune 23, 2026 at 9:24am
Break-ins:
The family home, when I was a kid. The never caught who did it, but they were obviously fearful, because the one thing they tried to take, was left on the stairs to the basement. They were clearly amateurs and, given that my parents were hosting an church event at a quasi-family cottage, they also probably read our church bulletin.
Our garage, years later: someone broke in during the night and stole my red ten-speed, which was poorly locked. They likely saw my brother, who had an expensive red racing bike which he rode to work. He kept it in the garage during the day and inside at night. Instead, they got a bike that I'd had since seventh grade (I had just finished first year) and was in need of repairs. I was planning on replacing it. Thieves never caught, but they probably felt pretty stupid.
Student rental home: Quick smash and grab while I was at the laundromat. They got the portable stereo, tv, and some cassette tapes. Officially never caught, but about a month later, someone was arrested in connection with another B&E in the area. The perp's house was filled with easily-flippable electronics. They had been surprised by the home owner and ran, dropping the.... no, seriously.... nunchuks they were carrying in case they encountered someone. The nunchucks had the owner's name engraved on the handle. So we never got our stuff back, but we got to be bit players in a "World's Stupidest Crooks" type of story.
My parents' house was broken into once again, decades later. They were looking for jewelry, clearly. My mother by then kept her "good" jewelry in a concealed location. My father's incredible workshop was never touched in either of these.
My brother's house. Perpetrators nabbed after they bragged about the B&E's at a bar. My brother and his wife got most of their stuff back. Another tale straight out of Trailer Park Boys (although it predates them). I have no doubt there are some clever burglars, and movies and TV love the master criminal character, but I suspect that a non-insignificant percentage of petty criminals are basic idiots. The commander may or may not be able to confirm this. I recognize that it's a reassuring thing to believe.
My apartment, around the time I met my wife. Thieves got CD player, CDs, TV, my old laptop, which, it being the 90s, contained no serious personal information and was due to be replaced. Little doubt the thieves were connected with a cleaning service, and thieves connected with that service or, more technically correct, an employee of that service, were eventually arrested. Never got my stuff back, but it was probably them. Obviously, police will eventually investigate a pattern that blatant: "hmm.... house cleaned by maid x, broken into next week..." The service is no longer in business.
My car. Tossed stuff, took my back-up bp meds (which have no street value). Left the old CDs. They're not worth stealing anymore.
Keeping fingers crossed for the remainder of my life. We have a good alarm system, and the response team, coincidentally, live around the corner from us.
The Good Mrs. Benson and I have never experienced a break-in of our home, either when we were living separately or after we lived together.
We almost had a break-in once, some thirty-one years ago.
Let me preface the tale by divulging that we have guns in the house, then and now. There's my service pistol and a small five-cylinder revolver that I keep for concealed-carry purposes. When the GMB received a long-barelled Colt .45 revolver from her father back in '92, I taught her gun safety. I taught her how to take the revolver apart and put it back together and how to clean it before I took her out to a gun range. When I did take her to a gun range and taught her the techniques of shooting, it turned out that she was a pretty good shot. About fifteen years ago, she purchased a small semi-automatic, and I taught her all the mechanics of that weapon, too. And I ensured that she got all the proper permits.
Thirty-one years ago, I was still working as a patrolman on the mid-night shift. One morning, after I got home, I asked the GMB how her night was.
Someone tried to break into the house, she told me. What happened, I asked.
In the wee hours, she had gotten up to use the bathroom and that's when she heard noises coming from the dining room. When she went to investigate, in the dark of the house---the lights were off---she saw the silhouette of a figure at the dining room window. The would-be intruder had already taken the screen off of the window and was working at the sash to get the pane open.
She had my interest for sure. What happened next?
The GMB said that she watched him for a minute. The crook had almost gotten the window raised, then she must've made a noise loud enough for the attempted burglar to hear because he suddenly broke off his efforts and ran off.
Thinking like a cop who'd dealt with several similar circumstances in the past, I told her that she was lucky she was heard because in 99 out of 100 cases, if a burglar discovers that someone is home, he abandons his break-in attempt. (Most burglars don't want to break in to a place if someone is home. First, because if they get caught, the penalties for breaking into an occupied dwelling are much harsher. Second, because they don't know who lives there. For all they know, it's some battle-hardened military vet who will wail the tar out of them, at best, if they get caught. That latter reason goes to this story.)
I asked the GMB, "Why didn't you just turn on the lights? That would've told the crook right off that someone was home and he'd have run away that much sooner."
"Because," she replied, "I had my pistol. If I had turned on the lights, it would've ruined my night vision, and when I shot at him, I might've missed."
Can anyone read that panel with no context and then fail to wonder what the context may be?
The Baron > Luis Olavo de Moura DantasJune 25, 2026 at 2:41pm
I assume that it's the old "Great White Hunter Pacifies the Primitive Savages by Giving Them Shiny Objects" cliche. Why he had a supply of harmonicas with him is another issue.
Replies
Maybe we could pool our resources and timeshare?
I wonder whether all of us put together could come up with that kind of scrstch.
Along with Collinwood and the Bevery Hillbillies' mansion in recent years.
[The police] didn't dust for prints.
I remember a cop taking information, not fingerprints.
Out of the hundreds of larceny from home/auto calls to which I responded as a patrol officer, nearly all of the victims wanted dusting for fingerprints---and in nearly all of those cases, I refused to request crime scene to do so.
Gathering evidence is one of the many ways that the average person has gotten an incorrect idea on how police work actually works by watching television. Because of C.S.I. and its spin-offs, along with later modern cop shows, many victims of break-ins believe that, once the crime scene techs are called in, they'll pull out their microscopes and fingerprint dust, gather the forensic evidence, and---poof!---the police will identify the crooks and get their stuff back in sixty minutes. It's called "the C.S.I. effect".
Here are the real-world facts. In 80-90% of house and auto break-ins/larcenies, the perpetrator(s) leave behind no evidence of forensic value. That includes fingerprints---and, no, it's not because the crooks always wear gloves.
How many people have been in your home? Friends, relatives, salesmen, repairmen, deliverymen . . . and they all leave fingerprints behind. That means if the crook(s) left fingerprints, they're going to be mingled with the prints of everyone else who's been in your home. Sure, the crime techs can eliminate your prints and those of any roommates. But can you provide the name of every person who's been in your home over the last six months? Can you even remember all of the people who've been in your home over the last six months?
And the same goes for your car. You might insist that only you have been in your car over the last six months, but are you sure? And what about if you'd had your car serviced? Those folks would've handled something inside your car, too.
O.K., one might think . . . so the crime scene tech collects a dozen different sets of prints. After he eliminates yours, can't he run the others through the super-scientific computerised local, state, and Federal data bases? Sure, but that doesn't necesarily lead to a hit identifying a set of prints with those whose prints are on record because of arrest. Or, conversely, four or tive hits might come back. Just because a person has an arrest record doesn't positively identify him as the one who broke into your house or car. Not by itself, that is---and I'll get to that in a moment. The painful fact is, in the vast majority of cases, the collexion of fingerprints at the scene of a break-in produces no usable resutts;
There's one signficant departure from that, and the experienced patrol cop knows to look for it. If an event or item can be definitvely connected with the break-in/larceny, then the cop will call in the crime scene techs. For example, if the burglar forced the lock of a sliding glass door, or cut the screen and reached through to handle it, the metal of the door may contain prints that definitively point to the crook. (Presumably, any of your friends, relatives, salesmen, or repairmen didn't break in through the sliding glass door.) A forced window may also contain valuable prints for the same reason. A forced door, like your front door, will probably not---because the crook kicked it in, or smashed it in with his shoulder.
A great deal depends on what the responding patrol cop observes at the scene. I remember one case, in which the family was gone for a week's vacation. When they returned, they discovered that vandals had broken into their house and, besides what they took, they tore the place apart. They destroyed furniture, smashed the television set, and took items such as flour out of the pantry and dumped it all over the kitchen. Ordinarily, there would've been no hope to obtain usable prints---except for one thing which I noticed. On the mantle of their fireplace stood an anniversary clock---you know, the kind in which the timepiece sits under a glass dome. For some reason, the invaders hadn't bothered to take it---but it had gotten their interest. I observed that there were ten clear, fresh fingerprints, from five fingers on each side of the glass dome. One of these Napoleons of crime had lifted the globe up to take a look at the clock inside, then, for whatever reason, decided it wasn't worth taking. I called crime scene for that one, and the prints were taken. Even more fortunately, they were matched up to one of local troublemakers who'd been in and out of the local jail. Because he could be positively identified as one who'd been in the house, the detectives were able to get him to talk, and the whole Hee Haw gang of lowlifes got a trip to the hoosegow.
Another break-out situation where it makes sense to dust for prints is if, say, upon fleeing, the crook drops your CD player on your back lawn. When you have something like that, if the surface of the dropped item will retain fingerprints, then the patrol cop will, indeed, call crime scene to dust it. Because, outside of your prints, the only other prints on the item will be the crook who dropped it. I once got called to a larceny of auto. After taking the account from the victim, I inspected his car. The crook had gained access by smashing the window of the passenger front door. The radio had been yanked out. The glove compartment had been forced open and the contents strewn across the front seat. There was nothing to be gained by dusting the car or its interior for prints. As I was explaining this to the victim and his family, the victim's adult son came into the house, holding an licence plate in both hands.
"I forgot to tell you," he said. "We kept this old plate in the back seat of the car, and I found it in the driveway. Can you get the crook's fingerprints from this?"
I looked at him, holding the metal plate with all ten fingers all over it.
"Not anymore," I told him. If he'd just left it where he found it, then it probably would've produced worthwhile print and photo evidence.
Often the victim would argue with me when I refused to call crime scene. "Then call your supervisor," he'd insist. "If you want to speak to him," I'd respond, "you can call him yourself." (For some reason, many citizens believe if they demand the patrol officer call his supervisor then he has to do it.) On the occasions when the victim did contact the supervisor, once I explained that the condtions of the break-in did not allow for usable fingerprints, the supervisor always backed me up.
Now, wait a minute, commander . . . even if there's a 80-90% likelihood that the perpetrator(s) left no usable prints behind, what if I'm in that 10-20%? Shouldn't you call for crime scene just in case?
No. That's because crime scene resources are limited. There are only so many crime scene techs working at any given time, and I worked in a city of almost 700,000 citzens. If I call you to a house break-in on a 10% chance, that means tying up a crime scene tech for an hour (or longer, if it's a case of total vandalism like the house I described above). That means a crime scene tech that isn't available if a homicide or a shooting or an armed store hold-up goes down. There were always more of those in one evening in my city than there were available crime scene techs working, so crime scene was always undermanned, even if they weren't bothered by requests that had little chance of producing usable evidence. It's unpleasant, but the police have to prioritise their assets.
I understand, the math is difficult. When your home has been invaded, your personal property searched, and your valuables taken, it's a major event in your life. It's the most important thing in the world. But, relatively, there are much worse crimes going down at or around the same time, and they have to take precedence. No cop wants to tell the loved one of someone who's just been gunned down in a hold-up that he has to wait for crime scene because they're out at a larceny from auto working with no real chance to get evidence.
I remember an occasion when my division had just had a new captain assigned, and she put out the word that patrol officers must call crime scene for all home and auto break-ins. It was partly public relations, but to be fair, also due to fall-out from the top brass. We had just gotten a new chief of police, and he didn't trust the experience or discretion of patrol officers or their sergeants. After that, I must've called crime scene four or five times a week on larcenies from home/auto that I knew full well did not have usable prints or other evidence. I uncomfortably had to apologise to the techs when they arrived---because they knew that I knew better.
After about two months, somebody must've talked to somebody, because the captain lifted the always-call-crime-scene requirement.
As for the attitude of the police, especially in your circumstance, Cap, I can't necessarily alibi it. As in every other position in life, there are bad cops and lazy cops and cops who've burnt out and just don't care, anymore. I can't say that you didn't get one of those, Cap, and if you did, I apologise. But there's also another syndrome in play here---one that I, unfortunately, fell into too often. You said you suffered one burglary in your life. To you, that was massive. It hit hard. You felt violated and outraged in a way never before or since.
For you, it was one time. But a patrol cop investigates a dozen or more of these a week. For even a dedicated, experienced cop who investigates properly, it's routine to him, including the emotional state of the victims. It gets difficult to put the victim's feelings into perspective. I can recall several instances where I was investigating a case where the apartment of a single, young female had been burglarised. Many times, these girls showed not just irritation or anger at being victimised, but outright fear; and they would declare that they had to spend the night with someone else in case the crook came back. I never said this out loud---I always said the right, comforting things---but every time I'd be thinking, "Why would he come back? He's already got all your stuff." Because, in truth, in all my time as a cop, I'd never experienced or even heard of a case where the crook came back to the same home in the same night. Because it's difficult (not a justification; just stating the fact of it) that it's hard for a cop who's gone through God-knows-how-many burglary investigations to remember that, sure, it's another day at work for him, but a life-changing event for the victim.
I hope that explains some of the behind-the-scenes things that go on when something like this happens to you and others.
.
Commander Benson said:
Obviously, Commander, you have more real-world experience with this kind of thing than I do, at least on the investigative side of such circumstances. All of my knowledge on that score comes from those cop shows I don't watch any more and reading crime fiction, especially Ed McBain's 87th Precinct novels and stories.
At least McBain took pains to be more accurate than most. Indeed, many of his novels went into exhaustive detail about forensics three decades before CSI: Crime Scene Investigation and its spinoffs and clones came into vogue. One I remember vividly described the different types of fingerprints as the Isola Police Department's CSI went to work. There are fingerprints left on hard, smooth surfaces from the oils and sweat from a person's hands; fingerprints left when the person touches a somewhat soft, malleable surface, like wax; and fingerprints fransferred when the person first touches something that leaves a stain, like paint, ink or shoe polish.
That doesn't mean that every surface yields a usable print. I used to be a devotee of Joseph Wambaugh's work, too; as a detective with the Los Angeles Police Department turned novelist, he also was more accurate than most. (Sometimes Wambaugh and McBain would try a little too hard to show their homework, so to speak.) I rermember a bit in one of Wambaugh's novels which a detective picked up a brick to toss through a window for some reason, and wiped it on his pants beforehand. His partner, incredulous, shouted at him, "What are you doing? You can't get lifts off a freakin' brick!"
We might note that running any prints one might gather through "the super-scientific computerised local, state, and Federal data bases" may be a waste of time also because your investigator may be trying to find a two-bit burglar from the millions upon millions of fingerprint records of arrestees, police officers, suspected terrorists, federal workers and members of the military services ... and the effort won't flag anyone who isn't in any of those categories.
On the other hand, sadly, I do have real-world experience on the other side of the equation, as a crime victim. Many years ago, when I lived in Florida, I got up in the morning and opened my door to find my car had been stolen. It was the first (and only) brand-new car I had ever owned, a gray Mazda 323. We discerned that the thief or thieves had punched out the lock on the driver's side door and probably hot-wired the car and drove it away while we slept; I found the lock in the grass. Stupidly, although I should have known better from reading all those McBain stories, I picked it up to give to the uniformed investigating officer who dutiflly took the report. I didn't really expect him to dust it for fingerprints, but I still shouldn't have.
Fortunately, I did get my car back; it was found about a mile away in a trailer park. Unfortunately, the thieves took it there to remove the alloy rims that came with the car; we found it resting on concrete blocks with all four wheels gone. Worse, the crooks gouged vicious things into the paint and stole a camera from the glove compartment and my toolbox from the trunk.
I can say that the uniformed officer who arrived was professional and probably competent. I say "probably" because the car wasn't recovered through any effort from the police. The trailer park somehow got my address, probably through my license plates, and sent me a letter telling me where the car was and asking me to retrieve it.
In the end, my auto insurance made me whole, paying for a new paint job and replacing the wheels and tires, although with basic ones, not the fancier ones that must have attracted the attention of the thieves.
Break-ins:
The family home, when I was a kid. The never caught who did it, but they were obviously fearful, because the one thing they tried to take, was left on the stairs to the basement. They were clearly amateurs and, given that my parents were hosting an church event at a quasi-family cottage, they also probably read our church bulletin.
Our garage, years later: someone broke in during the night and stole my red ten-speed, which was poorly locked. They likely saw my brother, who had an expensive red racing bike which he rode to work. He kept it in the garage during the day and inside at night. Instead, they got a bike that I'd had since seventh grade (I had just finished first year) and was in need of repairs. I was planning on replacing it. Thieves never caught, but they probably felt pretty stupid.
Student rental home: Quick smash and grab while I was at the laundromat. They got the portable stereo, tv, and some cassette tapes. Officially never caught, but about a month later, someone was arrested in connection with another B&E in the area. The perp's house was filled with easily-flippable electronics. They had been surprised by the home owner and ran, dropping the.... no, seriously.... nunchuks they were carrying in case they encountered someone. The nunchucks had the owner's name engraved on the handle. So we never got our stuff back, but we got to be bit players in a "World's Stupidest Crooks" type of story.
My parents' house was broken into once again, decades later. They were looking for jewelry, clearly. My mother by then kept her "good" jewelry in a concealed location. My father's incredible workshop was never touched in either of these.
My brother's house. Perpetrators nabbed after they bragged about the B&E's at a bar. My brother and his wife got most of their stuff back. Another tale straight out of Trailer Park Boys (although it predates them). I have no doubt there are some clever burglars, and movies and TV love the master criminal character, but I suspect that a non-insignificant percentage of petty criminals are basic idiots. The commander may or may not be able to confirm this. I recognize that it's a reassuring thing to believe.
My apartment, around the time I met my wife. Thieves got CD player, CDs, TV, my old laptop, which, it being the 90s, contained no serious personal information and was due to be replaced. Little doubt the thieves were connected with a cleaning service, and thieves connected with that service or, more technically correct, an employee of that service, were eventually arrested. Never got my stuff back, but it was probably them. Obviously, police will eventually investigate a pattern that blatant: "hmm.... house cleaned by maid x, broken into next week..." The service is no longer in business.
My car. Tossed stuff, took my back-up bp meds (which have no street value). Left the old CDs. They're not worth stealing anymore.
Keeping fingers crossed for the remainder of my life. We have a good alarm system, and the response team, coincidentally, live around the corner from us.
The Good Mrs. Benson and I have never experienced a break-in of our home, either when we were living separately or after we lived together.
We almost had a break-in once, some thirty-one years ago.
Let me preface the tale by divulging that we have guns in the house, then and now. There's my service pistol and a small five-cylinder revolver that I keep for concealed-carry purposes. When the GMB received a long-barelled Colt .45 revolver from her father back in '92, I taught her gun safety. I taught her how to take the revolver apart and put it back together and how to clean it before I took her out to a gun range. When I did take her to a gun range and taught her the techniques of shooting, it turned out that she was a pretty good shot. About fifteen years ago, she purchased a small semi-automatic, and I taught her all the mechanics of that weapon, too. And I ensured that she got all the proper permits.
Thirty-one years ago, I was still working as a patrolman on the mid-night shift. One morning, after I got home, I asked the GMB how her night was.
Someone tried to break into the house, she told me. What happened, I asked.
In the wee hours, she had gotten up to use the bathroom and that's when she heard noises coming from the dining room. When she went to investigate, in the dark of the house---the lights were off---she saw the silhouette of a figure at the dining room window. The would-be intruder had already taken the screen off of the window and was working at the sash to get the pane open.
She had my interest for sure. What happened next?
The GMB said that she watched him for a minute. The crook had almost gotten the window raised, then she must've made a noise loud enough for the attempted burglar to hear because he suddenly broke off his efforts and ran off.
Thinking like a cop who'd dealt with several similar circumstances in the past, I told her that she was lucky she was heard because in 99 out of 100 cases, if a burglar discovers that someone is home, he abandons his break-in attempt. (Most burglars don't want to break in to a place if someone is home. First, because if they get caught, the penalties for breaking into an occupied dwelling are much harsher. Second, because they don't know who lives there. For all they know, it's some battle-hardened military vet who will wail the tar out of them, at best, if they get caught. That latter reason goes to this story.)
I asked the GMB, "Why didn't you just turn on the lights? That would've told the crook right off that someone was home and he'd have run away that much sooner."
"Because," she replied, "I had my pistol. If I had turned on the lights, it would've ruined my night vision, and when I shot at him, I might've missed."
Boy, did I marry the right girl!
Can anyone read that panel with no context and then fail to wonder what the context may be?
I assume that it's the old "Great White Hunter Pacifies the Primitive Savages by Giving Them Shiny Objects" cliche. Why he had a supply of harmonicas with him is another issue.
-
600
-
601
-
602
-
603
-
604
of 604 Next