Review Article

Year : 2019 | Volume : 4 | Issue : 1 | Page :14 - 20

Bite Mark: Is it Still Valid??

Abirami Arthanari, Nagabhushana Doggalli, Karthikeya Patil1 , HP Jai Shankar1, A Vidhya

From the Departments of Forensic Odontology and 1 Oral Medicine and Radiology, JSS Dental College and Hospital, Mysore, Karnataka, India

Address for correspondence:

Dr. Nagabhushana Doggalli, E‐mail: drbhushan@rediffmail.com

Abstract

Bite mark evidence has been introduced in trials all over the country. Bite mark evidence, anaspect of forensic odontology, is the process by which odontologist’s (dentists) attempt to match marks found at crime scenes with the dental impressions of suspects. If a victim is bitten by a perpetrator during a crime and police have a suspect, odontologists can attempt to “match” the bite mark to the suspect’s teeth. There have been a lot of controversies in the identification of bite mark analysis in the past 15 years and acceptance by the law. While this review aims to explain the increasing number of wrongful convictions that is associated and related to the past with bite mark analyses and this has resulted in intense scientific and legal scrutiny. This article contains the current status and position of bite mark analysis. It explains about the highlights and drawback of bite mark identification and law’s evaluating and responding to unreliable and unscientific evidence.

Key Words: Bite mark, forensic odontologist, highlights and drawback of bite mark identification

Financial support and sponsorship

Nil.

Conflicts of interest

There are no conflicts of interest.

How to cite this article:

Arthanari A, Doggalli N, Patil K, Jai Shankar HP, Vidhya A. Bite mark: Is it still valid??. Int J Forensic Odontol 2019;4:14-20.