Monday, April 7, 2008

Kids Safety and Fingerprint Kits

The Houston Police Department will be at Proctor Plaza to get your child's fingerprints. You will have these records for the protection of your child. The police use fingerprints to help bring missing children home, and police departments across the country recommend that parents keep records of their children’s fingerprints along with certain other information.

Please contact Pam Foote at 713-862-6907 for further details.

Thank you neighbors!

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Preparing a Fingerprint Kit:
http://www.essortment.com/family/childfingerprin_sivx.htm#

Any fingerprint kit should include more than just a fingerprint record. Most importantly, it should have space where you can keep a recent photo of your child; this photo should clearly show your child’s facial features. There should also be space to record identifying information about your child, such as distinguishing marks, medical history, and your child’s description.

In addition to recording fingerprints, the kit should offer a way to keep a sample of your child’s DNA. Many commercial kits include a cheek swab with a container to store it, but this kind of DNA sample is not necessary. Instead, the kits distributed by police departments usually direct parents to save a sample of their child’s hair. The hair strands saved must include the follicle, or root (this will appear as a small lump at the end of the hair), and can be pulled from your child’s hairbrush. Enclose the hair in a clean white piece of paper, then place the folded paper in a plastic bag and keep it with the kit.

Finally, there should be space where you can note down the medical offices which have your child’s full medical and dental records, should these be needed by police.

Once you have assembled the kit, maintaining it is important. As mentioned above, fingerprints of young children will need to be repeated when they are older. The photograph kept with the records should also be updated quite frequently, two or three times a year. Each new photo should be of good quality, not distorted or fuzzy. Every time you update the photo, check over the information recorded in the kit and update it if anything has changed. Keep the kit in a safe place, but make sure it will be accessible in the event of an emergency.