AST Digital Magazine July 2017 Digital-July | Page 46
Volume 14
July 2017 Edition
Why is it used? The technology has also reportedly been used
by police in Florida to make arrests related to a
2011 homicide.
Just like how each person’s fingerprint is unique,
the same is true for DNA. A forensic DNA sam-
ple from a crime scene or terrorist strike can be
matched to a database, for example, to try to
identify the culprit. Rockingham County Sherriff’s Office in North
Carolina also used Parabon technology during
its successful investigation into the murders of
Douglas “Troy” and LaDonna French.
This is a big leap ahead for the use of DNA in
capturing terrorists and criminals.
But now if there is no match in a database, then
there is still a way to use the DNA to put a face
to the crime.
Investigators can use the DNA as a human blue-
print too and have Snapshot transform it into a
picture.
Capturing criminals
Early adopters in law enforcement, military and
counter terrorism team have had great success
with this new tool. It has been so successful that
in that short span of time, Snapshot has been
used by more than 80 agencies and Snapshot
analysis has been undertaken in ten countries.
Although there was lots of different DNA at the
crime scene, there was no police database
match. In Januray 2015, a month after the de-
but of Parabon’s Snapshot service, Rockingham
County Sherriff’s Office contacted the company.
José Alvarez, Jr. was arrested for the murder in
August 2015.
In Jul y 2016 Alvarez pled guilty to two counts of
first-degree murder and was sentenced to two
consecutive life terms without the possibility of
parole.
Investigators have been using Snapshot to help
solve tough current criminal cases as well as
crack cold cases.
Detectives from the Montgomery County Police
Department in Maryland, for example, recently
used the Parabon technology to create a com-
posite for a suspect in a series of unsolved bur-
glaries and rapes that occurred between June
19, 2010 and Sept. 2, 2012.
(Learn More. Courtesy of Q13 Fox News, Dark Sleuth and
YouTube. Posted on April 6, 2016)
Other applications
Beyond a military and law enforcement tool,
Parabon says it is developing other potential ap-
plications for their research, including the ability
to predict the risk of developing Alzheimer’s Dis-
ease.
(The Montgomery County Police Department held a news
conference on Monday to discuss an unsolved 1992 homi-
cide and to release a new suspect composite that has been
produced by Parabon NanoLabs. Courtesy of myMCMedia
and YouTube. Posted on June 12, 2017)
Original
post
http://www.foxnews.com/
tech/2017/07/06/new-dna-technology-creates-
digital-sketch-terrorists-faces.html
To contact Parabon, visit their website at https://
snapshot.parabon-nanolabs.com/.
For ordering information, please email snap-
[email protected] or call (703) 689-
9689 x251
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