Thursday, March 28, 2024

Forensic crime lab receives county, city support

Wilmington’s three-person forensic crime lab is getting some help thanks to additional funding from city and county governments.

Wilmington City Council and New Hanover County commissioners have approved two requests that are aimed at expanding the lab’s testing capabilities.

At their meetings this week, city council appropriated more than $210,000 from a grant through the North Carolina Governor’s Highway Safety Program to sustain the lab’s three positions and fund additional equipment and expenses, while commissioners approved funding for an additional forensic chemist to add to the lab’s staff of one manager and two part-time chemists.

The additional position will cost $83,459, to be funded in the county’s upcoming budget. The city’s allocation, a result of grant money, will not involve city funds.

The added resources are aimed at expanding the lab’s capabilities in testing suspects’ blood-alcohol levels and types and weights of narcotics. While the lab is housed in the Wilmington Police Department, its results help to process the inmate population at the New Hanover County Detention Center, which is nearing capacity.

County Manager Chris Coudriet said the jail is at a point where construction of an addition is becoming inevitable. However, by funding the position and improving the lab’s ability to process inmates, Coudriet said the county’s contribution would accelerate that process and reduce the number of inmates being held for their day in court.

“If we can expedite that, that should have inmates facing their days in court earlier,” Coudriet said, noting the chemist position would be funded through fiscal year 2018, in conjunction with grant funding.

Coudriet described the service as a state-level function, but he and District Attorney Ben David said the lab for the State Bureau of Investigation is backlogged and understaffed, resulting in the need for a local lab. Where the state lab can take as much as 18 months to complete some tests, the Wilmington lab provides results in one month, David said in a presentation Monday.

“I agree with you that this is probably a local Band-Aid on a state problem,” David told commissioners. “But we can’t afford to wait.”

With the additional resources, the lab is expected to better serve the Wilmington region by expanding its services to more agencies. The lab currently provides blood-alcohol analysis—the only local agency in southeastern North Carolina to do so, according to the police department—to 16 local and state law enforcement agencies. With the additional staff and equipment, the lab plans to double that reach to 32 agencies, expanding its scope to include Pender County along with New Hanover and Brunswick counties.

In a letter to commissioners, presented at Monday’s meeting, David said: “A new forensic chemist would allow the lab to expand testing for other agencies, ultimately moving inmates’ cases to a disposition more quickly.

“My office strives to achieve justice in an expeditious manner, ensuring that the rights of both victims and defendants are upheld in the process,” David said in the letter. “Local testing of additional drug cases at the WPD lab would impact not only drug cases, but also the victim-based crimes that wait in line to reach trial behind those cases awaiting lab results.

“The county’s support for this staff member will not only increase the speed at which these cases are disposed, but will also help to alleviate the number of inmates in the New Hanover County jail.” The cost of each inmate at the jail, David told commissioners, is $80 per day.

“That’s a lot of money for this county,” David said Monday. The additional resources would allow his office, he said, “to bring defendants to the starting line of the trial process much quicker.”

Chairman Woody White, an attorney by trade, lauded the local lab’s efforts, noting he’s seen the effects of the state’s wait time firsthand.

“When you’re sitting there trying to counsel someone to plead guilty or not guilty, when we’re trying to give them advice on whether to enter a plea or to take it to trial, it’s a lot better to do it quicker,” White said. “When we know that the City of Wilmington forensic lab has a test there a month or two later, we know what our options are. It speeds things up.

“It gets people out of jail quickly, it gets their case disposed more quickly, and ultimately it helps them on their road to recovery, in most instances,” White said. “I personally see a lot of cases where your ADAs (assistant district attorneys) are not able to meet their burden, because they don’t have that evidence. This is an incredible, collaborative solution to something the state should solve. Hopefully it will solve it one day.”

Jonathan Spiers is a reporter for Port City Daily. He can be reached at (910) 772-6313 or jonathan.s@portcitydaily.com. On Twitter: @jrspiers

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