SCIENCE
Although it has rarely if ever been done successfully, experts say it is possible for criminals to mutilate their fingerprints with acid or otherwise until recognition is dubious or impossible. Medical societies have been shown photographs of faces completely altered by plastic surgery. Year ago Dr. Carleton Simon, Manhattan criminologist, proposed an identification system based on the pattern of blood vessels in the eye, which is never the same in any two individuals (TIME, Dec. 16, 1935). A malefactor would not be able to beat this system, Dr. Simon pointed out, unless he...