Sergeant Terry Dunnett No 5521

Police Artist

West Australian Police 1976 - 2006

Terry has been a Police Artist since 1979, full time since 1988. He was instrumental in forming the Police Artist section of the Western Australian Police in 1990 which later became the Forensic Imaging Unit with a staff of five. In 1991 he has trained with New Scotland Yard, South Wales Police, Cambridgeshire Police and the E-Fit company in the UK.

He was the first Australian Police Officer to be invited to attend the FBI Facial Imaging / Police Artist Course in 2000 at the FBI Academy in Quantico, Virginia USA. This was a wonderful opportunity and enabled Terry to further broaden his knowledge and enhance his skills.

He has made presentations on various aspects of visual identification to the Australasian Judges Conference in Adelaide, Judicial Seminars in Perth, to members of senior executive and students of Forensic Psychology. The Psychology Departments of Australian and Canadian Universities have utilised his skills and knowledge in digital identification projects evaluating memory retention abilities.

Three separate computer solutions, PAI, Digiboard and iFace, to address shortcomings in offender identification methods have been developed by Sergeant Dunnett and have led to acceptance and changes in judicial procedures that benefit investigative areas and the justice system.

Sergeant Dunnett has given opinion evidence in courts of law, at all levels, on composite compilation, digital procedures and witness recall abilities and is considered an Expert in the field of Forensic Art.

For his innovation and dedication to the Western Australia Police in the field of forensic imaging, Terry was awarded the Commissioner's Medal for Excellence in November 2005.

In December 2006 Terry retired from the Western Australian Police after over 30 years service.