IAPE Evidence Blog

Fisher Com­mu­ni­ca­tions, Inc., KOMO News Net­work, komonews.com
BYLINE: Denise Whitaker
Link to Arti­cle
One Video

Poulsbo, WA

POULSBO, Wash. — A state audit found Poulsbo Police Depart­ment lacked over­sight over its own evi­dence locker after gold, guns and cash mys­te­ri­ously disappeared.

The miss­ing items prompted the audit, which was released on Tues­day. The report rec­om­mended the depart­ment tighten up on record­keep­ing and con­trols over the con­tents of the locker.

On the list of miss­ing items is a gold neck­lace, which cost the city’s insur­ance com­pany more than $1,000 to replace, as well as $2,000 in cash that was sup­posed to be trans­ferred from the police depart­ment to the city’s finance department.

Semi-automatic hand­guns set to be destroyed also dis­ap­peared from the locker. The state traced the guns back to a police clerk respon­si­ble for trans­port­ing the guns. That for­mer clerk, Amanda Dixon, has been charged with theft.

Poulsbo Mayor Becky Erick­son said her con­fi­dence in her police chief has not wavered. She added the depart­ment has made sig­nif­i­cant changes to pre­vent sim­i­lar inci­dents in the future.

“We’ve moved the police. We have a new evi­dence locker. We have new soft­ware and we have new per­son­nel,” said Erickson.

The police depart­ment is now located in City Hall, and it now uses new soft­ware that includes a bar code sys­tem that will keep track of all pieces of evi­dence in the pos­ses­sion of the police department.

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Inter­na­tional Asso­ci­a­tion for Prop­erty and Evi­dence
“Law Enforce­ment Serv­ing the Needs of Law Enforce­ment”
www.IAPE.org

The Asso­ci­ated Press, Lebanon Daily News, ldnews.com
Link to Article

Brad­dock, PA

LIGONIER, Pa. — A sus­pended Pittsburgh-area police offi­cer already await­ing trial on charges of steal­ing crack cocaine from a police evi­dence room now faces charges in six more cases — includ­ing steal­ing money and a credit card from a deaf man he arrested.

Brad­dock Bor­ough Coun­cil in Octo­ber sus­pended 30-year-old James Scuf­fle, of Plum, after he was ordered to stand trial on the ini­tial charges. He allegedly used the stolen crack cocaine to buy the silence of an ex-girlfriend who had helped him com­mit some crimes.

Among other things, Scuf­fle is now also charged with steal­ing a shot­gun from the Brad­dock evi­dence locker and hav­ing his ex-girlfriend sell it on the street. He’s also charged with steal­ing a vehi­cle trailer, some credit cards, some vol­un­teer fire depart­ment equip­ment and pos­sess­ing some more cocaine.

Scuffle’s attor­ney hasn’t returned a call for comment.

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Inter­na­tional Asso­ci­a­tion for Prop­erty and Evi­dence
“Law Enforce­ment Serv­ing the Needs of Law Enforce­ment”
www.IAPE.org

World­Now and KTUL, ktul.com
BYLINE: Mike Massey
Link to Article

Tulsa, OK

A key piece of evi­dence in a high-profile mur­der is acci­den­tally destroyed by Tulsa Police.

The miss­ing evi­dence could allow Phillip Sum­mers to avoid the death penalty.

He was sen­tenced for killing Ples and Shelly Vann in 2004.

But an appeals court ordered a new trial.

TPD says the gun was destroyed because of a cler­i­cal error.

Dis­trict Attor­ney Tim Har­ris says the gun’s destruc­tion makes it dif­fi­cult for his office to seek the death penalty. 

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Inter­na­tional Asso­ci­a­tion for Prop­erty and Evi­dence
“Law Enforce­ment Serv­ing the Needs of Law Enforce­ment”
www.IAPE.org