Is this anonymous letter writer someone you know?

I had a client last week who brought me three handwriting samples - two of them she thought were written by the same person. She wanted to know if they matched a third sample(written by someone knew). The first two were only signed with the initial "J," following her name and a one-sentence message written in cursive on yellow post-it notes urging her to go call for a free service regarding her credit cards and attached to newspaper articles . I immediately told her that the first two samples (I'll call them #1 and #2) attached to the newspaper articles were definitely not written by the same person (the writing slants varied a great deal), and that, in my opinion, they were a "scam" especially since the articles didn't mention a bona fide company's name (always suspicious to me, that's deceptive trade practice in my mind). No charge for that. But she insisted that it was driving her nuts to know whether or not either of them matched sample #3, the person she knew. She was willing to pay for peace of mind.

So I began to analyze samples #1 and samples #2 (the anonymous writers) for slant, depth, and 5 to 6 major personality traits in order to show her they weren't written by the same person. She nodded her head in agreement that these were definitely written by different people as I indicated the vast difference in slant. I went on to analyze the slant on sample #3 (the writer she knew). Immediately, I was able to show her that sample #2 was not a match with #3, so we were able to set that aside as irrelevant. The slants between #1 and #3 matched, but the depth varied - one was heavy and one was average. I continued on with my analysis. But when I began listing and comparing the personality traits on paper, showing what strokes were totally different, her eyes brightened up. She stopped me and said, "I can see it's not the same person! I'm VERY satisfied. You have given me piece of mind, now I can sleep at night. I'm confident that the person I know didn't send me these letters." She even opened her wallet and offered to pay me extra!

If you're comparing two handwriting samples for a match, start with the slant (the hardest thing to change), followed by depth (also hard to change). Is the slant to the right, vertical or to the left? Is the writing heavy (carved into the paper and dark), average (medium darkness with no scores on the backside of the paper) or light (thin, light strokes with no indentations on paper).

Right slant:





Vertical slant:





Left slant:





Variable slant:





Heavy depth:

Medium depth:

Light depth:

If the slant and the depth are the same, you will need to identify additional personality traits by consulting a certified handwriting analyst.

By the way, I also pointed out to my client that ALL THREE writers had the "lying loops" of deception, so I suggested throwing all future letters like this in the trash, and not trusting any of them with her money! You can't be too careful... there are a lot of scam artists out there these days.

Deceptive:

Marty