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From road accidents to robberies or hooliganism cases – the images taken by cameras may serve as important pieces of evidence during court trials. Nevertheless, many times, the poor quality of such recordings does not allow the forensic experts to rebuild the course of a crime. The solution comes from the experts of the Police Forensic Center, who can now improve the quality of such recordings to establish the circumstances of a crime and thus contribute to the delivery of justice. With the assistance of two modern software installed, the forensic experts can recover even the records that were destroyed. The respective software was provided by UNDP under the “Support to Law Enforcement Reform in Moldova” project, supported by the U.S. Government.
One of the software is meant to improve th quality of images and of audio and video recordings, being designed to process, restore and analyze video recordings and images in a simple, rapid and accurate manner. The other software is used for extracting and recovering video recordings and other metadata from the video surveillance systems. The two software programs are universal and are compatible with any video storage devices. At the same time, thanks to the new technologies, the forensic experts may extract and process extremely large recordings within a shorter period.
The software helps solving crimes
“The requests to analyze and certify the authenticity of images and of video and audio recordings come from the Prosecutor’s Office, General Border Police Inspectorate, and National Anticorruption Center,” explains Eduard Cuschevici, Head of Phono- and Videogram Examination Section within the Police Forensic Center.
Eduard has graduated the Technical University of Moldova and is a qualified digital forensic expert with eight years of experience in the Police Forensic Center. He says that the software he currently uses is much more efficient than the ones used previously, and this allows him and his colleagues to manage a bigger workload within a shorter period of time, as well as to enhance the reliability of evidence filed for court trials.
Even erased images can be recovered
Recently, the forensic experts succeeded to fully recover a video which has been erased in an attempt of hiding the traces of a crime. The device from which the video recordings were erased had a huge storage capacity - 4 terabytes, but the examination process lasted only 24 hours.
Besides the recovery of the images or improvement of their quality, the software allows the experts to respond to other requests coming from law enforcement bodies. Hence, in some cases they investigate and confirm if certain recordings are not fabricated or if the content of recordings is not altered.
The software allows the experts addressing some specific questions as well, for instance the ones related to the brand of the car, the image of which appears on the camera, car plate number or even the speed of the car. With the assistance of new technologies, the experts succeed to establish the physical features of the persons suspected of committing crimes, and even the clothes the suspect was wearing during the day he/she committed the crime.
Another challenge refers to adjusting the hour from the video recording to the real hour. As the cameras are not connected to Internet, they cannot automatically switch to summer or winter time. When technical problems emerge, some devices are set to come back to the initial date and hour, which is usually that of 1 January 1970. The software allows matching the hour and establishing the exact time when the event caught by the camera occurred.
To enhance the skills for using the new software, five experts from the Police Forensic Center have completed during May two training courses provided online by a specialized company based in the EU.
Since 2014, the Police Forensic Center has benefited from assistance provided by the U.S. Government through UNDP Moldova. Due to these interventions, in February 2018 the institution has been accredited in compliance with the Standard SM SR EN ISO/CEI 17025:2006 “General requirements for the competence of testing and calibration laboratories” in six areas of expertise: ballistics, traceology, fingerprints, handwriting, forensic document examination and digital forensics.
The accreditation confirms the compliance with the requirements of the standard and allows recognizing at the international level the results of forensic examinations performed in the Police laboratories from Moldova.
The institution is now preparing to obtain accreditation according to the Standard ISO 17025 in the area of examination of narcotic substances, benefiting from UNDP and U.S. Government assistance under the “Support to Law Enforcement Reform in Moldova Project”.
