Evidence Retention Laws: The Dirty Little Secret in Evidence Room Overcrowding?
Okay, maybe “dirty little secret” is a bit much. Still, one factor leading to today’s evidence room overcrowding crisis is the state-mandated evidence retention periods that police agencies must abide by. Our blogs have alluded to the myriad of state laws, standards, best practices, and policies and procedures law enforcement agencies must follow hundreds of times now. But we’ve never delved into how evidence retention laws affect the operations of evidence rooms across the country, and more specifically, we’ve not discussed their impact on the inventories that police agencies must maintain. We’re about to take on that topic, discuss why those laws are essential, and explore how to lessen their impacts.
Evidence Retention Periods: What are They and What do They Do?
Evidence retention periods are state laws that mandate the time agencies must hold onto criminal case evidence. These periods last well beyond the end of the initial finding of guilt or innocence, dismissal of the case, or the closure/suspension of the investigation. These regulations recognize that evidence must remain available for appeals or future legal needs.
Put Yourself in This Person’s Shoes
Every few months, national news outlets have a report such as this – put yourself in this person’s shoes: After spending many years in prison, convicted of a heinous crime, your case is reopened. DNA tests didn’t exist during the investigation. They do now. Such testing is performed on the evidence that remains available – thanks to the state’s retention laws. The results indicate what you have maintained all along. You weren’t even at the crime scene, and you are innocent.
A judge agrees.
You are set free.
That example has to be the most powerful aspect of the retention laws across the country. A close second is identifying the correct perpetrator and charging them with the crime.
Real Life Effects
State-mandated retention periods naturally cause evidence to accumulate over time. No matter the case status, its evidence must stay put and remain viable until its retention period runs its course. That could mean for decades or even forever.
So, evidence rooms continually receive new items while keeping the old. Most evidence facilities weren’t built to accommodate the amount of long-term storage items that they are required to store.
But, store them they must.
That’s when inventories become disorganized. Left to fester like an old sore, the word “disorganized” no longer tells the tale. “Chaotic” becomes a more accurate descriptor of not just the inventory but the environment of the evidence room itself. Individual items become hard to find. They can be misplaced, lost even, stored in places that are too hot or humid, and generally they become much more difficult to manage according to the standards of evidence storage.
And let’s go back to putting yourself in another’s shoes. If you had to go to work every day in a place that’s truly chaotic – when it doesn’t have to be – how would you feel about your job? Or the organization you work for? How long before your motivation hits zero? And when that happens, what would you do?
Compliance, Constraints, and Maybe Someday?
Agencies must comply with their state’s retention laws. Failure is not an option here as there could be severe legal repercussions if evidence is needed but has already been destroyed.
Most departments cannot afford to build new facilities, and many don’t have the space to do so. While it is not impossible—a police department in central Illinois is about to break ground on a new stand-alone evidence and property facility— but it was seven years in the making. This solution would have to be considered an over-the-horizon solution for most agencies. It would not address the evidence room chaos that calls for immediate action to rectify.
The need to store physical evidence will never go away, at least not with our current technology. Maybe someday we’ll have something like Star Trek’s Holodeck, which used holograms, like millions of them all at once, to create accurate 3-D scenes with which the crew could interact. Apply that technology to evidence inventories. That would save space. Wonder what chain of custody and other legal ramifications would be like for that? Probably pretty complicated, huh?
But it still seems like a good idea.
Solutions and Temporary Fixes
Audits and Purges: Conducting regular audits will identify items eligible for release or destruction. Setting up and sticking to a regular audit schedule will allow personnel to petition the court for an item’s removal as soon as possible after its retention period has been satisfied. This process will purge items from the inventory as quickly as the law allows.
Infrastructure Improvements: Building new or remodeling present facilities can serve as a long-term solution, but departments considering this must take into account that it does nothing to help them in the short term. Interior equipment like high-density shelving units and large-capacity refrigerators can ease overcrowding in evidence rooms and should not be overlooked as a way to maximize storage space.
Technology and Training: Acquiring the most up-to-date evidence management programs, ones that fit your needs and work best for your agency, will go a long way toward helping your personnel manage your inventory. Modern programs feature bar-coding or RFID technology that speeds up check-in and locating items in the inventory. These programs should also include modules that track evidence retention periods and notify personnel automatically when those periods have been satisfied.
Along with appropriate software training, evidence technicians should be formally trained to understand and perform their jobs to the best of their ability. They should be updated on new laws and procedures and equipped to succeed.
And while this doesn’t help with inventories, it could go a long way toward keeping your evidence techs on board your agency. They should be in the loop and informed about what their employer is doing to rectify a chaotic evidence room.
Off-Site Storage: A few private companies scattered across the country specialize in evidence storage, preservation, and management. These companies professionally provide long-term evidence storage and can be the answer to the overcrowded evidence room problem – exacerbated by state retention laws – that police agencies are experiencing today.
Conclusion
While retention laws ensure that evidence is available for future legal needs, they contribute to the growing overcrowding problem in evidence rooms nationwide.
Audits and purging, infrastructure improvements, training and technology upgrades, and off-site storage can all play a role in improving the on-hand criminal evidence inventory crisis that is negatively affecting police operations and, potentially, the criminal justice system itself.
Agencies should be proactive regarding this issue. If you are from a department with no problems with capacity in its evidence room, let this blog serve as a warning and allow you to plan ahead so you don’t reach the crisis stage as many other departments have.
Fortress Plus Solutions
Fortress Plus Solutions is one of those companies just alluded to. Located in the greater Chicago area, its centralized location in the lower forty-eight states allows thousands of law enforcement and other clients to access its services. Staffed with evidence management experts, FPS guarantees it meets or exceeds all the same standards and laws that the public sector must follow. They do so in a modern, secure facility that’s staffed 24/7 and designed to handle the storage and preservation needs of any type and size of evidence you have on hand.
Fortress Plus Solution’s services are customized to its clients’ needs, and its fees reflect that. With over one hundred years of law enforcement leadership experience on staff or directly supporting our mission, we understand modern law enforcement’s budget limitations and that our services must be cost-effective.
And they are.
Contracting with Fortress Plus Solutions is the solution to the increasing evidence management and storage problem facing law enforcement agencies today.
To learn more about our services, click here.