Opening of Fingerprint Vault

Fiji’s first Forensic Fingerprint Vault was opened today an outcome of a partnership between the Fiji Police Force and the Australian Federal Police.

The Project is funded by the Pacific Police Development Regional (PPD-R) is aimed at assisting in the management of fingerprint data by housing in a central location where it will be logged chronologically.

The Criminal Records Office receives approximately 2000 fingerprints per month from the 36 Police Stations all of which are processed daily.

Handing over the keys of the Vault to the Commissioner of Police Brigadier General Sitiveni Qiliho was the Australian Federal Police Senior Liaison (Pacific) Detective Superintendent of Police Adrian Morton who said under the #Vuvale and #solesolevaki partnership, Australia in Fiji will continue to support policing efforts not only in Fiji but in the Pacific as we benefit as a region.

There are 300-500 fingerprints received for Police Clearance Vetting per month for both local and overseas applicants. Prior to this partnership, there has never been a storage for fingerprints.

The initiation of the Project was done by the Director Forensic Science Services Acting Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP) Margret Marshall during a meeting in Samoa in 2019 whilst being the Chair of the Pacific Forensic Working.

The project supports the Commissioner of Police’s intent on improving customer service delivery and ensuring successful prosecution, the provision of safe localized long-term storage of physical fingerprint documents enables the criminal records and fingerprint office to produce timely paperwork and retrieval of records.