Evidence rising of space crunch for crime items
DNA advances, laws force huge expansion of storage facilities; Police face growing burden 

By Allison Klein
Sun Staff
Originally published March 24, 2002

At a time when police departments - and defense attorneys - rely more and
more heavily on crime scene DNA, law enforcement officials face a
practical problem: what to do with the mounds of material piling up in police
evidence rooms, from eating utensils and blood-stained carpets to tell-tale
weapons with fingerprints. 

"We just don't have the space down here to keep all that evidence," said Ed
Koch, director of the Baltimore Police Department's crime lab. "It's a
phenomenal amount of evidence." 

And if proposed legislation passes in the General Assembly, police will have
no choice but to make more room for evidence. 

The pending bill would require all DNA evidence to be kept for the duration
of the prison sentence of the person convicted of the crime, unless all agree
it should be destroyed. Current law requires such evidence be kept for three
years. 

In jurisdictions where the annual homicide totals hover at one or two digits -
such as Anne Arundel and Baltimore counties - keeping the evidence for
homicide and rape cases is manageable. Both counties maintain all such
evidence indefinitely, regardless of whether a suspect has been convicted,
served prison time or died. 

But in Baltimore, which recorded 259 killings in 2001, police are
hard-pressed to find space for increasing evidence loads. 

Last year alone, the department collected 400,000 pieces of evidence from
75,000 cases, an increase of almost 10 percent from a decade ago. 

This year, Koch said, the caseload is expected to surge to at least 85,000
because of more aggressive policing, especially for drug violations. In
addition, the city maintains evidence from pending cases and from 5,000
unsolved homicides and rapes that go back to the early 1900s. 

The evidence cache in the basement of Baltimore's downtown police
headquarters on Fayette Street has expanded in recent years to a room in
another police building - as well as to a complex of outdoor trailers in an
undisclosed, guarded location. 

Even that may not be enough for long. Koch has identified 72,000 square
feet of warehouse space, on Russell Street and in Locust Point, that would
provide temporary space for expansion. They could be filled within 10
years, Koch said. 

As of October, Baltimore police stopped destroying DNA evidence,
expecting that cases may be reopened and the evidence needed, Koch said.
That action anticipated a new state law, which took effect in January,
allowing criminal cases to be reopened at any time based on new DNA
evidence. 

That means police are now holding onto more evidence than ever. 

"We can't give money back to a victim's family if it has blood on it," Koch
said, because of the DNA implications. "You also have stolen guns that are
used in crimes you can't give back." 

And the macabre flood would likely increase under the evidence-retention
requirements now moving through the General Assembly. 

The proposal recently was folded into a bill requiring anyone convicted of a
violent crime to give a DNA sample to police. The state Senate approved
the combined bill Thursday; the House of Delegates approved an earlier
version of the bill but would still have to approve the revised version. 

"The main thing we wanted was preservation of evidence, and this bill does
that," said Del. Lisa A. Gladden, a Baltimore Democrat and a sponsor of an
early version of the bill, which had as its main sponsor Del. Ann Marie
Doory, another Baltimore Democrat 

Sen. George Della, also a Baltimore Democrat and a sponsor of the Senate
version, called it "a common-sense law that will bring the law into
conformity with the technology we have today." 

Advocates around the country have been pushing for DNA retention laws
for years. 

"Making sure the evidence is not destroyed is vital," said Huy Dao, assistant
director of New York-based Innocence Project, which has helped to free
about 50 prisoners across the country based on DNA evidence. "It's
insanely frustrating to close a case because evidence was destroyed or
lost." 

In 1993, Kirk Bloodsworth, of Cambridge was cleared by DNA testing and
released from prison after serving nine years - including seven on death row
- in the killing of a 9-year-old Rosedale girl. 

"I'm in favor of keeping evidence if it will exonerate somebody," Koch said.
"We'll hold onto everything we need to." 

And preservation of evidence can be important to prosecutors as well. 

This month, a Pikesville man was retried on murder charges after his first
conviction was thrown out on appeal. All the physical evidence was
accidentally destroyed after Keith Brown's first trial in 1996 on charges of
shooting his 19-year-old pregnant mistress. 

In his first trial, Brown was convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced
to life in prison without parole. In the retrial, Brown was convicted of
second-degree murder and was sentenced last week to 35 years in prison.
He will be eligible for parole in 13 years. 

While prosecutors, defense lawyers and politicians agree on the importance
of preserving DNA evidence, it remains up to the police to cope with
complications of storing it. 

Under the legislation, Koch said, police would not be able to destroy or
return to a victim's family anything with DNA on it. That includes a driver's
license with a drop of blood on it, a gear shift with fingerprints or eyeglasses
with saliva. 

"When you start looking, you think DNA could be on this, DNA could be on
that," Koch said. 

The implications of such a law are on display in California, which has laws
preventing destruction of DNA evidence for the length of a felon's prison
term. That law is causing headaches for large cities such as Los Angeles. 

"Space is an issue, it is always something we battle with," said Christine
Sanders, a forensic DNA analyst for the Los Angeles Police Department.
"We have huge walk-in freezers and refrigerators and about three or four
refrigerated trucks. This is just a short-term plan." 

Sun staff writer Sarah Koenig contributed to this article. 

Copyright © 2002, The Baltimore Sun