The Craziest Cases I’ve Worked as a Forensic Handwriting Expert

People ask me about crazy cases all the time. They’re usually hoping for something out of a crime show. Fair enough. I’ve got a couple.

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Case One: Sitting Across From a Murder Suspect

Early in my career, a District Attorney asked me to collect handwriting samples from a man suspected of double homicide.

That meant walking into an LA county jail, sitting down face-to-face with the guy, and asking him to write.

People always assume that must have been tense. Hostile, even. It wasn’t. He was cooperative. He wrote what I asked. The whole thing was calm.

The reason I was there: investigators had found graffiti on a tarp covering the bodies of two victims. They believed he had tagged it, gang-style, and they wanted to compare that tag to his known handwriting. This raises a question most people never think to ask: can graffiti actually be compared to regular handwriting?

Sometimes, yes. But it’s not a simple side-by-side comparison. Gang tagging is stylized. It’s built around identity and recognition. That means the same person’s tag can look dramatically different from his everyday writing, and sometimes that difference is intentional.

What stuck with me most wasn’t the accusation. It was his handwriting itself. Controlled, precise, almost elegant. Nothing like what you’d expect.

That happens more than people realize. Handwriting tells you something about a person.

Here’s the twist: the graffiti analysis never made it to court. What did was a separate letter he had written while incarcerated. That’s the reality of forensic document work. You examine everything. Not all of it ends up in front of a jury.

Case Two: Three Days on CNN

The second case people ask about didn’t take place inside a jail. It took place inside a television studio.

When a new suspect in the JonBenét Ramsey case was arrested overseas, the story came roaring back into the national news cycle. I ended up doing several days of media commentary, including an appearance on CNN with the late Larry King.

To be clear: I was not part of the original investigation. My mentor, Phyllis Mattingly, was the official handwriting expert for law enforcement in Colorado. My connection to the case came through that professional relationship and my own background in the field.

What made those days unusual had nothing to do with the handwriting. It was the environment around it.

When a case goes national, the science gets absorbed by the narrative. Media pressure, public opinion, speculation. It all competes with the actual evidence. What you say gets processed through what people already believe. That’s a fundamentally different challenge than working a case quietly in a lab or a conference room.

It taught me something I carry into every high-profile case now: stay focused on the document in front of you, regardless of the noise around you.

Most of My Work Looks Nothing Like This

Here’s the honest picture: those two cases are outliers.

The bulk of what I do involves civil disputes. Contracts. Contested wills. Business disagreements. Questioned signatures on real estate documents. The kind of cases that don’t make headlines but can absolutely make or break someone’s financial life.

In a city like Miami, where real estate changes hands constantly, international businesses sign contracts across multiple languages, and estate disputes routinely run into the millions, document fraud is more common than most people want to believe.

These cases may not be dramatic. But they are decisive. What matters is one clear, defensible answer: Is this signature authentic? Was this document altered? Can your expert hold up under cross-examination?

That’s the job.

If You Have a Handwriting Question in Miami

If you’re dealing with a questioned document or a disputed signature, the first step is a consultation. We’ll assess your evidence and tell you directly whether handwriting analysis can help your case and what it would take to make that analysis hold up in court.

floridahandwritingexperts.com

Or call us directly: 1-305-459-1544

Bart Baggett
Forensic Document Examiner | Expert Witness | Legal Consultant
CEO, Handwriting Experts Inc.

Q1: What does a forensic handwriting expert actually do?
A: A forensic handwriting expert examines documents to determine authorship, identify forgeries, and present findings in a form that courts can understand and rely on.

Q2: Can graffiti be used as handwriting evidence?
A: Under the right conditions, yes. Because gang tagging is often highly stylized, the comparison requires careful methodology and a thorough review of the person’s known writing samples.

Q3: Are most handwriting cases criminal?
A: No. The majority are civil cases involving contracts, estates, real estate documents, and financial disputes.

Q4: Was Bart Baggett part of the JonBenét Ramsey investigation?
A: No. His mentor, Phyllis Mattingly, served as the official handwriting expert for law enforcement in Colorado. Bart later provided media commentary when a new suspect emerged in the case.