Questioned Business Documents

Questions related to business documents typically involve questions of forged signatures, substituted pages, copy manipulations, or authenticity of the documents themselves, such as stock certificates.

In all cases, we will need to examine (if not the original), the very best copy available, as well as suitable exemplars in quantity and quality so a comparison may be made.

In cases where there are real estate documents involved that have been notarized, we will also request to see the matching entry from the notary log. If necessary, we can refer counsel to a qualified fingerprint examiner, as well.

For questions of authenticity, such as a stock certificate or a check where the payee entry or amount has been changed, originals must be submitted to our laboratory for examination. If no original exists, there are techniques that can be done to solve these issues, however, it will result in a qualified opinion.

Please download our Guidelines for Exemplars to help gather the necessary signatures and handwriting exemplars required for the examination. In general, we will need to see at least 10 to 15 normal course of business genuine signatures (or handwriting, if the question involves handwriting) dated as close in time as possible (before or after) the date on the questioned document.