Determining Intersecting Ball-Point Ink Strokes with Different Aging

The order of laying down homogeneous intersecting strokes of ball-point inks has been assessed using a range of different spectroscopic and analytical techniques for recent inks and for inks with a time difference of 4 years. These techniques are infrared reflectance photography with luminescence, fluorescence micro-spectrophotometry, Fourier transform infrared spectrometry, high resolution liquid chromatography and gas chromatography with mass spectrometry. This paper presents a combined method applicable to forensic cases aimed at resolving homogenous intersecting strokes of ball-point ink to determine whether they were made at the same time or, on the contrary, they were intersecting strokes laid down with an acute time difference, taking four years as an age reference.