Fraud attempt in a paternity test modifies action protocol in...( This release is available in Jos ...)

This release is available in Spanish.

Researchers from all over the world have been carrying out paternity tests regularly. Samples are usually collected from mouth and saliva cells to carry out the DNA analysis.

The team of Dr Jos Antonio Lorente Acosta (director of the Laboratory of Genetic Identification of the University of Granada) carries out these forensic studies commissioned by the court in cases of paternity tests, for the identification of possible criminals or to carry out DNA databases (such as in the case of missing relatives).

The detection of a fraud attempts in a paternity test case in 2007 is changing the action protocol of forensic teams in similar cases. The team of Dr Lorente encountered a strange case: the saliva analysis (epithelial cells from the interior of mouth) collected from a person undergoing a paternity test gave an incongruous result, a DNA which could not come from the man who had carried out the test.

The revision of the case revealed that they had followed the usual procedure: the suspect washed his mouth and after that they took the samples with a cotton swab. After repeating the analysis, there was an only one possible conclusion: In the mouth of that man there was DNA from two different persons. After dismissing other possibilities, the question was: how was it possible" We arranged to meet the person in question, we showed him the result and we explained him that we suspected that he had manipulated the samples which, as it was a trial in judicial investigation, could bring him serious consequences. Faced wit the evidence, he admitted that, shortly before the sample taking, he put into his mouth some saliva he kept in a little container.

It was n attempt to evade the responsibility in a case of extramarital paternity demand, and he admitted that, wh
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