IAPE Evidence Blog

Hat­ties­burg Amer­i­can
BYLINE: JIMMIE E. GATES

Hat­ties­burg, MS

Local law enforce­ment agen­cies say they lack both the space and exper­tise to store DNA evi­dence that a new state law requires them to preserve.

The law that went into effect in March says the evi­dence from crim­i­nal cases must be kept — but doesn’t say where.

Agen­cies had hoped the Mis­sis­sippi Crime Lab would pre­serve and store DNA evi­dence for them after their cases were resolved.

But the lab also doesn’t have the capac­ity either.

“Maybe in the future we can keep it when we get a (new, larger) place to store it,” state Crime Lab Direc­tor Sam How­ell said last week. “We don’t have the stor­age space now.”

Holmes County Sher­iff Willie March, newly installed pres­i­dent of the Mis­sis­sippi Sher­iffs Asso­ci­a­tion, said the Crime Lab is the best place to keep evi­dence no longer needed for active investigations.

“When we get a con­vic­tion, as far as we are con­cerned, the case is over. … We are keep­ing it in our evi­dence room, but we don’t know if it’s the right place or tem­per­a­ture for pre­serv­ing DNA evi­dence,” March said.

Mississippi’s 82 coun­ties han­dle DNA evi­dence in dif­fer­ent ways. Some may not col­lect DNA in all inves­ti­ga­tions because it is too costly.

The new law says that if DNA evi­dence is col­lected as part of the reg­u­lar inves­ti­ga­tion into a crim­i­nal case, it is to be pre­served. The evi­dence would be kept while the felony crime remains unre­solved or the time the per­son con­victed of the crime remains in custody.

There is no spe­cific penalty out­lined in the DNA bill for not pre­serv­ing DNA evi­dence, but it’s expected that sanc­tions could be sought in court on behalf of inmates.

“We had a brief­ing with the dis­trict attor­ney down here to try to under­stand the new law,” Jef­fer­son Davis County Sher­iff Henry McCul­lum said. “We have to make sure we hold it in our pos­ses­sion for a period of time. The way it is look­ing now is every­one will be respon­si­ble for stor­ing their own.”

Jack­son Crime Scene Inves­ti­ga­tor Charles Tay­lor said Fri­day he didn’t even know about the law.

Tay­lor said Jack­son has always sent cer­tain items to the state Crime Lab for test­ing and receive them back once the test­ing is complete.

Will McIn­tosh, staff attor­ney for the Mis­sis­sippi Inno­cence Project, said he can under­stand law enforcement’s con­cern about DNA or other bio­log­i­cal evi­dence pil­ing up and becom­ing unman­age­able, but he said it shouldn’t be a worry because the law allows for a small sam­ple to be kept instead of an entire item. He cited as an exam­ple keep­ing a frac­tion of a mat­tress with DNA evidence.

The bill also allows DNA evi­dence to be destroyed after a period of time if notice is given to all par­ties and they agree to it, McIn­tosh said.

A 23-member task force that helped craft the leg­is­la­tion said the cur­rent Crime Lab isn’t equipped to han­dle the addi­tional vol­ume of evidence.

The task force report didn’t man­date a cen­tral­ized loca­tion for stor­ing DNA evi­dence but sug­gested the state Crime Lab in Jack­son as the most suit­able location.

Sen. Kelvin But­ler, D-Magnolia, who co-sponsored the leg­is­la­tion, said he has not heard any­one com­plain about the law. He said it is needed, but did not have an answer to solv­ing the preser­va­tion issue.

“Other states are doing it, and I feel it some­thing we need. In the long run it’s going to help us all,” But­ler said.

McIn­tosh said the most impor­tant thing was to get a law passed that pre­serves DNA evi­dence and allow inmates to peti­tion for testing.

“We are plan­ning to file soon (on behalf of some inmates) under the law,” McIn­tosh said of the national, state and New Orleans offices of the Inno­cence Project.

The 2008 releases, based on DNA tests, of inmates Kennedy Brewer and Levon Brooks, both charged with mur­der, spurred the leg­is­la­tion. Brewer had been on death row.

It was through the national Inno­cence Project that Brewer and Brooks had their con­vic­tions over­turned. The Inno­cence Project often uses DNA to exon­er­ate indi­vid­u­als wrongly convicted.

In 2005, an effort was made to reopen the case of Richard Chap­man, who was 16 when he was charged with rap­ing and rob­bing a Jack­son woman. He was con­victed and sen­tenced to life in prison in 1982 on the rape charge. He was sen­tenced to serve four years on the rob­bery charge.

Chap­man said he was with his mother at the Mart 51 Shop­ping Cen­ter on Terry Road when the alleged rape occurred.

The New Orleans Inno­cence Project, which han­dled some Mis­sis­sippi cases, tried to reopen Chapman’s case and received a court order to have city, county and state offi­cials search for evi­dence in Richard Chapman’s case, but no evi­dence surfaced.

It was deter­mined that bio­log­i­cal sam­ples and other evi­dence were destroyed by an April 19, 1985, court order.

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Inter­na­tional Asso­ci­a­tion for Prop­erty and Evi­dence
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