Someone pointed out that it may be that the CBI report stated that there were no “usable” fingerprints. Consequently those reading the report believed it meant that the flashlight was wiped down. However, it would be a mistake to conclude that partial or smudged fingerprints were not examined. Typically, lab people will lift even partials or smudged fingerprints from an item, because there may exist some small identifiable “points” of comparison. We won’t know because as poster otg commented once: “We can only guess, since we don't have access to the lab reports on evidence.”
Websleuths Crime Sleuthing Community - View Single Post - Was BR involved? #2
As for the psychology of wiping down the flashlight, you bet, it doesn’t really make sense for RDI or IDI. If one thinks it was an intruder, why didn’t the intruder take it with him? Likewise, why wouldn’t the family have just left the fingerprints on the flashlight, after all it was their Mag-lite (identified by friend JF and housekeeper LHP). For my 2 cents: I agree totally with DeeDee249 and that’s because of my viewpoint of the distancing aspect. For me the intent of all of the staging is to distance the crime from the family. ( I can picture a chaotic, panicked scene, and baffling choices of altering the crime scene to create this distance.) IIRC, some of the FBI (not JD) did evaluate the cs from the perspective of staging.
This topic may just come down to our speculation as to what was in the mind of the perp, and that can be interpreted differently.
1) If one believes it was in realty an intruder, then the idea of staging and distancing is nonsense. The perp was simply eliminating the forensic evidence he left behind.
2) If, on the other hand, the family was involved, then the distancing worked like a charm and created enough confusion that we still speculate what could have been in the mind of the perpetrator or the stagers.
MHO