Voiceprint Law and Legal Definition
Voiceprint refers to the printed form of one’s voice used to compare with voice of a person in question. It is a distinctive pattern of curved lines and whorls, made by a machine. The method is used to identify the person who uttered the material words in dispute.
The voiceprint is used as a technique of speaker identification by spectrographic analysis. The term is defined as “a method of identification based on the comparison of graphic representations or spectrograms made of human voices.” The method utilizes a machine known as a spectrograph which separates the sounds of human voices into the three component elements of time, frequency and intensity. By using a series of lines or bars, the machine plots these variables across electronically sensitive paper. The result is a spectrogram of the acoustical signal of the speaker, with the horizontal axis representing time lapse, the vertical axis indicating frequency, and the thickness of the lines disclosing the intensity of the voice. [People v. Kelly, 17 Cal. 3d 24, 27-28 (Cal. 1976)].
