The use of dental evidence, including dental records and bite marks, for identification in criminal and legal proceedings. Bite mark comparison in particular has drawn significant scientific criticism over its reliability as a means of identifying a specific individual. An early published bite-mark conviction was the 1948 Gorringe case in England, in which pathologist Keith Simpson used bite marks on the victim to help secure a murder conviction against her husband.
Facts
Disputed
Known LimitationThe American Board of Forensic Odontology progressively narrowed its own standards between 2007 and 2018, no longer sanctioning terms asserting individual identification "without doubt" and limiting permitted conclusions to exclude, not exclude, or inconclusive; the Board and practicing odontologists maintain that exclusion determinations, distinct from the individual-identification claims the 2009 NAS report addressed, retain forensic value. 2 Sourced to the subject's own accountThe American Board of Forensic Odontology progressively narrowed its own standards between 2007 and 2018, no longer sanctioning terms asserting individual identification "without doubt" and limiting permitted conclusions to exclude, not exclude, or inconclusive; the Board and practicing odontologists maintain that exclusion determinations, distinct from the individual-identification claims the 2009 NAS report addressed, retain forensic value. What It ExaminesTeeth and dental work, used to identify the dead by comparison with dental records, and historically also for bite mark comparison, a practice now under serious scientific challenge. 1 Formalized YearSourced to the subject's own accountDates to the founding of the American Board of Forensic Odontology in 1976, the certifying body whose own standards later narrowed what a bite-mark comparison may conclude (see known-limitation). Known LimitationThe 2009 National Academy of Sciences report found no scientific basis for the claim that bite mark comparison can reliably identify a biter, while leaving dental identification of the dead uncontested. 3 Discipline
Discipline (category) FAQs
Is bite-mark evidence still used in court?
In a narrower form. The American Board of Forensic Odontology no longer sanctions testimony that a bite mark identifies one specific person to the exclusion of everyone else; since standards updated between 2007 and 2018, its diplomates are limited to exclude, not exclude, or inconclusive findings. Some courts continue to admit exclusion testimony under those narrower standards, while a 2022 NIST draft review found the underlying research insufficient even for that use, so the discipline's courtroom role remains actively contested rather than settled.
Connections
Associated With
Source Forensic Anthropology (Wikipedia)
Cases Where Used
Bite-mark testimony matching Bundy's teeth to a bite left on victim Lisa Levy was decisive at his 1979 trial.
Source Dr. Samuel D. Harris National Museum of Dentistry: The Most Infamous Bite Mark Case
Examines Within
Open Questions
Source Wikipedia: Forensic Dentistry
Pioneered By
Source Wikipedia: Keith Simpson (pathologist)
Sources
1. National Institute of Justice: Forensic Sciences
2. Wikipedia: Forensic Dentistry
High-profile criminal cases sectionQuote, High-profile criminal cases section
One of the first published accounts involving a conviction based on bite marks as evidence was the 'Gorringe case', in 1948, in which pathologist Keith Simpson used bite marks on the breast of the victim to seal a murder conviction against Robert Gorringe for the murder of his wife Phyllis.
3. Strengthening Forensic Science in the United States: A Path Forward
Saferstein, Criminalistics: An Introduction to Forensic Science
Richard Saferstein, Pearson
Dr. Samuel D. Harris National Museum of Dentistry: The Most Infamous Bite Mark Case
Cases Where Used: Ted Bundy Case, Case summaryQuote, Cases Where Used: Ted Bundy Case, Case summary
Bundy had extremely crooked lower teeth, the molds of which allowed for easy identification within the bite mark analysis
Wikipedia: Keith Simpson (pathologist)
Pioneered By: Keith Simpson, Lead sectionQuote, Pioneered By: Keith Simpson, Lead section
He pioneered forensic dentistry, and was prominent in alerting physicians and others in 1965 to a previously under-diagnosed form of child abuse
Forensic Anthropology (Wikipedia)
Associated With: Forensic Anthropology, Introductory sectionQuote, Associated With: Forensic Anthropology, Introductory section
Along with forensic pathologists, forensic dentists, and homicide investigators, forensic anthropologists commonly testify in court as expert witnesses.
Open Questions (1 open question)
Does bite-mark comparison retain any valid forensic use?
The 2009 National Academy of Sciences report found no scientific basis for concluding that a bite mark can be matched to one person's dentition to the exclusion of all others, and a 2022 NIST draft review reached a similar conclusion. The American Board of Forensic Odontology has accepted this for identification claims and, between 2007 and 2018, progressively restricted its own diplomates to three findings only: exclude, not exclude, or inconclusive. Whether even an exclusion determination meets a reliable scientific standard, or whether the underlying premise that human dentition and bite-mark transfer are sufficiently distinctive and stable has itself been adequately tested, remains contested between the certifying body and the discipline's critics.
What would resolve this A published, adequately powered black-box study of forensic odontologists' exclusion decisions, of the kind the 2011 Ulery fingerprint study provided for latent-print examiners, measuring false-exclusion and false-non-exclusion rates under casework-like conditions, would give the exclude/not-exclude claim the empirical grounding NAS and NIST found missing for identification.
Forensic odontology and forensic science methodologyWikipedia: Forensic Dentistry
Dissenting Readings (1 dissenting reading)
Known Limitation
The American Board of Forensic Odontology accepts that bite-mark evidence cannot support an individual "match" and has since 2013 to 2018 restricted its own diplomates to exclude, not-exclude or inconclusive findings, with recommended blind verification by a second examiner; the Board maintains that a properly conducted exclusion determination remains useful to an investigation even though the stronger identification claims the 2009 NAS report and the 2022 NIST draft review criticized are no longer defensible or sanctioned.
A dissenting reading, from American Board of Forensic OdontologyWikipedia: Forensic Dentistry
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