The most robust set of answers to this question can be found in a report by the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST), an advisory group of the nation’s leading scientists and engineers, which in 2016 produced an in-depth review of forensic science in criminal courts. The report summarizes the available evidence on the validity of fingerprint analysis and especially on the likelihood of erroneous identifications (false positives) such as the one involving Mayfield.
