Archive for the 'Signed Out Evidence' Category
Special Report: Keeping the Evidence
November 19, 2009www.coloradoconnection.com
BYLINE: Brittney Hopper
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El Paso County, CO
COLORADO SPRINGS, COLO — In this special report, FOX21 News learns that having hard evidence is critical to getting a conviction in court. That’s why the El Paso County Sheriff’s Office takes extreme measures when handling evidence.
“Someone sent a guy a grenade in the mail and when he opened it, it blew up and it killed him and it damaged the car pretty well,” said Dan Istvan, evidence custodian for the El Paso County Sheriff’s office.
A red car has been sitting in the sheriff’s office’s dirt lot since 1994 — still no murder suspect but the evidence will stay.
“Most of the evidence, especially if it’s a murder, will be kept forever unless it’s released by the District Attorney’s Office,” said Istvan.
A different red car was used for a kidnapping where police say the victim was put inside the trunk and put up a good fight but didn’t win.
“Carbon monoxide got to her. And killed her,” said Istvan.
A new trend police say they are seeing more and more of are arson cars. The suspect will light the car on fire to try and burn any evidence. Police tell FOX21News this does make it more difficult, but ultimately investigators say they will get to the bottom of it.
In order to preserve the integrity of evidence of a crime scene, human contact should be avoided. Just a few cells from skin can compromise the results. It’s very important to keep careful track of the chain of custody of each sample, according to Istvan. The chain of custody is a list of date and times and locations of people who have handled the crime scene evidence.
“Deputies put evidence into the deputy’s lockers. Every morning we empty the lockers out and check them and make sure they are packaged right and put on a shelf and marked and that’s where it will stay,” said Istvan.
The oldest box is from a homicide from 1972. Inside the boxes evidence ranges from papers to a rubber band, but bloody clothing is handled differently. A bloody shirt will go into a drying room then stored in a freezer so it won’t smell.
Some may ask, why keep so many items for so long?
If just one piece of evidence takes a criminal off the streets, police say it’s worth it.
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International Association for Property and Evidence
“Law Enforcement Serving the Needs of Law Enforcement“
www.IAPE.org
Lost and not found: Cocaine for Naples police training goes missing
October 19, 2009www.naplesnews.com
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BYLINE: RYAN MILLS
Naples, FL
NAPLES — Tiny bars of soap, stiff towels, Gideon Bibles — there are just some things that guests expect when checking into any hotel.
But some lucky guest may have found an unexpected gift inside a Naples hotel room last spring — a package of cocaine — thanks to the Naples police department, no less.
Two veteran Naples police officers lost a packet of cocaine during a training exercise last spring, according to a recently released internal affairs investigation. The cocaine was believed to have been left in a local Best Western hotel room.
However, even though the allegations were sustained, neither officer was reprimanded in the case.
“It was looked at as strictly an honest mistake by two hardworking police officers,” Naples police spokesman Michael Herman said.
On May 13, officers Chuck Ankenbauer, a 13-year-veteran, and Linda Lines, a 16-year-veteran, checked out a narcotics kit from the department’s property and evidence room so they could conduct K9 training at Naples High School, according to the investigation. When they began hiding the two 2-gram packets of cocaine that were supposed to be in the case, they realized that one of the packets was missing.
Training records indicate that the cocaine was probably lost in April in either a Best Western hotel room, in the department parking lot, or in the rental car lot at the Naples Municipal Airport.
Both officers suspect the cocaine was left inside the hotel room on April 29, because their routine was disrupted that day when Lines, who usually handles the narcotics, was called out to a scene, reports said. Ankenbauer ended up hiding the cocaine instead.
When Lines returned to resume the training, both officers’ dogs were “lively” — leaping on the bed, biting pillows, knocking down pictures on the wall — and had to be secured to avoid damaging the room, reports said. They decided to conclude the training session early.
Lines told an investigator that she did not remember who collected the drugs that day, as she was more concerned with straightening up the room. She said that, at the time, there were no inventory-control mechanisms in place to ensure that no drugs were missing when signing in or signing out a narcotics kit.
That has since changed, Herman said.
Now officers have to document their training items on a per-instance basis, Herman said. Unit supervisors will review those logs monthly, and a full inventory of the kit is done quarterly.
“These are highly responsible veteran officers who as human beings made a simple mistake,” Herman said. “They immediately notified their supervisors to the situation.”
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Connect with Ryan Mills at www.naplesnews.com/staff/ryan_mills
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International Association for Property and Evidence
“Law Enforcement Serving the Needs of Law Enforcement“
www.IAPE.org
Lawyers want trial judge’s testimony
September 12, 2009WXVT-TV Delta News, www.WXVT.com
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New Orleans, LA
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Lawyers for a former New Orleans policewoman condemned for murder and the cousin condemned for helping her want their trial judge called as a witness in new appeals.
Attorneys for Rogers LaCaze want Judge Frank Marullo to testify about allegations he once signed a handgun from the court’s evidence room out to Antoinette Frank, later convicted of killing her partner and two others at a restaurant.
Judge Laurie White heard arguments Friday, but did not immediately rule. She set two more hearings Oct. 15. One is on LaCaze’s motion to remove Marullo from the case. The other is for a separate motion by Frank, also asking for a new judge.
Prosecutors accused the defenses of judge-shopping in an attempt to cancel the convictions and death sentences handed down in 1995.
Information from: The Times-Picayune, http://www.nola.com
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International Association for Property and Evidence
“Law Enforcement Serving the Needs of Law Enforcement“
www.IAPE.org