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The day after Fairfield resident Larry Farwell gave a public lecture on his new "Brain Fingerprinting" technology, he found out he was wanted by the CIA.
Dr. Farwell, Chief Scientist and President of the Human Brain Research Laboratory, had developed a unique computer technology that detects whether a person has committed a crime. Farwell calls it "a scientific method to identify criminals and clear the innocent with extremely high accuracy through measuring electrical brain signals." With this technology, Farwell says he could have solved the O.J. Simpson case in one day.
Naturally, the CIA wanted to know more. On learning the full story about Farwell's device, the CIA was impressed enough to fund his research for several years. Farwell has also worked in an unofficial capacity for the FBI. The media has picked up on the significance of Farwell's research, too, and has featured his revolutionary Brain Fingerprinting technology on network and cable news shows, the Discovery Channel, and in U.S. News and World Report.
To begin research and development for a government contract, Farwell founded the Human Brain Research Lab in Maryland in 1991. Three years later, he moved to Iowa, where he continues research and development, and has just begun marketing his invention for use in the field.
How Brain Fingerprinting Works
Farwell explains that this "truth detector" is based on the fact that the brain is central to all our activities. In everything we do, the brain is always the key player--planning the activity, executing it, and recording it permanently. The memories of that event can be retrieved, usually at will whenever we need the information.
To determine if a suspect has actually committed a crime, words or pictures relevant to the crime are flashed on a computer screen, along with irrelevant words or pictures. The subject's electrical brain responses are measured through a headband equipped with sensors. When the brain processes information that it recognizes from previous experiences, a specific brain wave response is elicited, which Larry calls a MERMER--"memory and encoding related multifaceted electroencephalographic response."
A computer analyzes the brain response to detect the MERMER, and thus determines scientifically whether or not the specific crime-relevant information is stored in the brain of the suspect.
Explains Farwell, "First of all, we have to collect and preserve the specific kind of evidence demanded by the technique. This means that investigations will have to include experts trained to recognize and collect information from crime scenes specifically suited to identifying the person through brain MERMERS.
"Then this evidence is presented on the computer. A series of words or pictures is flashed on the screen. The computer records the brain waves produced in response to what the suspect sees. The responses are recorded as a wave form. By analyzing the pattern of the wave form, we can determine if the subject is recognizing what he sees. If he didn't commit the crime, he won't even know which words or pictures are relevant. But when a guilty person sees the evidence, he immediately recognizes it and his brain reacts before he can stop it."
Farwell uses the example of the O. J. Simpson case to make his point. "If Simpson is guilty, then his brain recorded all the details of the crime--details he would have no other way of knowing than by committing the crime. Had the investigation been conducted by an expert in Brain Fingerprinting--who had the expertise to evaluate and collect the appropriate evidence for eliciting brain MERMERS--then we could use the Brain Fingerprinting technology to detect a match--or no match--between the evidence at the crime scene and the evidence stored in Simpson's brain. We would know definitively whether he is guilty or falsely accused."
How accurate is this system? Farwell produces data showing that Brain Fingerprinting has been proven 100 percent accurate in over 100 tests, including tests on FBI agents and for the CIA.
Passing FBI Scrutiny
When the FBI heard of Farwell's invention, they decided to put it to the test on their own agents at their facility in Quantico, Virginia. They worked with Farwell to design a test that would determine which subjects were FBI agents and which were not. The subjects were told to try to conceal from Farwell whether they were connected with the FBI. They were presented with information that only FBI agents would know from their training. The results showed that the Brain Fingerprinting was 100 percent accurate. Out of 20 subjects, it correctly identified the 17 that were agents and the 3 that were not.
Researchers at the U.S. Navy designed a test to identify their medical personnel from other staff, using terms familiar only to those trained by the Navy. Once again, the test showed 100 percent accuracy.
Will Brain Fingerprinting be able to solve every case? "No," Farwell says. "Certainly Brain Fingerprinting can solve many times more cases than DNA and conventional fingerprinting. However, even after investigators throughout the world have been trained to collect and preserve evidence appropriate for use in Brain Fingerprinting, and Brain Fingerprinting has become universally available, the new technology will not be able to solve every case.
"Brain Fingerprinting, like conventional fingerprinting and DNA fingerprinting, can only determine whether or not a suspect was present at the crime scene. There are some cases where a person may have been present for a legitimate reason. For example, a suspect may claim to have been there and seen it all, but to have been a witness and not a perpetrator.
"But if a criminal is shown information that only he would know, his brain will respond before he has time to deny it. There is no way to fool the system."
Farwell says this system could have sniffed out Aldrich Ames, the CIA agent who sold information to Russia. He had been given standard polygraph tests and fooled them.
Standard lie detectors use a polygraph, which determines a person's stress level by measuring galvanic skin response, respiration, heart rate, and blood pressure. But because they can be deceived, Farwell says that polygraph tests are not admissible in court as evidence. He says that evidence from this new method might someday be acceptable in court.
Aiding Criminal Investigations
In the last century, law enforcement agencies developed new technologies for criminal investigation that are now standard means for identifying criminals. Fingerprinting, a process discovered in the 1890s, made it possible for investigators to collect and preserve evidence left at the scene of a crime. The fingerprint traces can be matched with the patterns on the fingers of suspects to place him or her at the crime scene.
DNA fingerprinting was a second breakthrough. Like fingerprints, a person's DNA can be used to connect or match evidence collected at the crime scene. DNA can be used to clear a suspect by showing that evidence from the scene of the crime does not match that of the suspect.
Larry explains to me that both DNA and conventional fingerprinting have been highly successful in exonerating a number of individuals who were falsely convicted of serious crimes.
The drawback of these technologies, he says, is that DNA samples and fingerprints are found in only a very small percentage of cases--one in one hundred. Because of this, there has been a great need for other accurate, scientific means of matching evidence from the crime scene with a suspect.
"I was thinking about this one day and realized that the record of the crime would, of course, be stored in the criminal's brain," he says. "The memories are there, and through this computer technology, we can access them, or in the case of someone who is innocent, we can determine precisely that the memories are not there."
Larry feels that his device can solve many, perhaps most crimes, quickly, accurately, and scientifically, and thus reduce the enormous costs of crime detection.
Currently, Dr. Farwell is negotiating with law enforcement agencies throughout the country for implementation of this new detection program. "With it," he says, "no criminal would be safe from his own brain waves--the criminal's own brain could become evidence for the prosecution."
