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Winona Police Investigator Angie Evans speaks to classes on a regular basis and finds that about 90 percent of people have seen the show, most of whom by now have preconceived notions about collecting evidence.
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Winona Police Investigator Angie Evans places a brown paper bag containing evidence into a temporary storage locker Thursday in the evidence intake room at the Winona Police Department. Evans has worked for 12 years overseeing thousands of pieces of evidence gathered by officers and investigators.
(Photo by Melissa Carlo/Winona Daily News) |
She prefaces every presentation with a warning that she’s never watched a minute of it and won’t.
It’s just not accurate, she says.
Maybe 30 percent is believable to her and other evidence experts like Winona County Sheriff’s Department Investigator Rob Averbeck. He simply sighed when asked how the show has influenced people’s views on evidence collecting.
He recounted an episode in which the TV guys matched a hair sample to a picture of the suspect within seconds.
“It takes months,” Evans said.
“If their DNA is on file,” Averbeck added.
Evans, who has handled every piece of evidence brought into the police department for the past 12 years, and Averbeck, who’s been the go-to guy for evidence in the county for four years, discussed with the Daily News this week how evidence is collected and analyzed in real life and what exactly is locked away for safekeeping.
Evidence reality
Although cases wrap up in less than an hour on an episode of “CSI,” in real life, investigations take months and even years to solve.
The reason for such long delays lies in the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension and its one crime lab that serves the entire state. With the advent of DNA testing technology developed in the late 1980s and its success in solving some crimes, backlogs for even the most mundane of cases have delayed results. Evans said sending a hair, blood or saliva sample to the BCA requires months of waiting just to see if the sample is viable enough for further testing.
Experts test the sample to see if ample DNA can be extracted from it and send a report back to the requesting agency, Evans said. If the case hasn’t wrapped up through different means, the sample is placed in a three-tiered classification and prioritization system, she said. Top priority belongs to evidence obtained in a crime against a person, followed by drug and fire cases. The third rung is for everything else.
Evidence obtained during a burglary typically takes six months to analyze, and anything in the third tier can be in St. Paul for a minimum of a year, Evans said.
People compare that sluggish pace to “CSI” and get frustrated, Averbeck said.
“This is a hurry-up-and-wait game,” he said.
“We’re just as frustrated as everyone else,” Evans said.
Most cases aren’t solved through evidence anyway, they said. Most cases are solved through witnesses, victims and criminals’ admissions. But DNA evidence is key to cold cases — most recently in Winona, the case of the 1985 killing of Ada Frances Senenfelder. At the time of the stabbing, DNA testing was in its infancy and many samples kept over the next 23 years had to be tested and re-tested before finally pointing investigators toward Jack Willis Nissalke and his associates. Senenfelder’s is Winona’s only cold murder case, and Nissalke has been charged in her death more than two decades after the killing..
Evidence collection
Both officers and investigators collect evidence at crime scenes. How much they pick up depends on the case, however. Some cases generate little to no evidence. Others, as in the case of the Paul Allen Gordon triple murder in 2004, can create hundreds of pieces. The final Gordon tally was 304, Evans said.
Collectively, thousands of pieces of evidence are gathered every year, she said.
Once the evidence is collected by officers, it’s brought to the evidence intake room in the police department to receive proper labeling and a barcode. Most items are packed in heat-sealed bags. Items that can absorb moisture or are prone to rust or mildew are stored in paper bags. Larger items that don’t fit into bags are simply tagged.
Every item is entered into a recently installed $25,000 grant-funded computer system that allows for easy cataloguing and searching, Evans said. But only three people have access to the locked-up room to protect the “chain of custody.”
If the police were ever challenged in court, only a select few could be questioned, limiting the chances of evidence being handled improperly, she said.
The sheriff’s department’s evidence room is a little more lax and old-fashioned. Averbeck said just about every deputy has access to the evidence room, and records are kept on paper.
All evidence is held through sentencing and full completion of a case in court. Once the 90-day appeal time limit expires, stolen property is returned to its owners and drugs are destroyed. Law enforcement has the option to absorb forfeited vehicles and guns into the department if they’re deemed useful. If not, guns are destroyed at the BCA, and vehicles are sold to the public at auction.
Some evidence is held indefinitely, however. Evans said the oldest evidence she knows of came from the 1977 murder of Shirleen Howard. Although the killer is dead and her husband, who was convicted of hiring the assassin, has been released from prison on parole, the county attorney’s office won’t let the police dispose of the evidence. Evans said she doesn’t know why they want it kept, but it’s still there.
What counts as evidence?
The evidence rooms sound sterile and boring, but there are a few oddities down there and just about everything can be considered evidence.
Winona County Chief Deputy Ron Ganrude said his evidence room boasts a potato fork used in an assault and a buffalo hide found abandoned on the highway.
Averbeck said there’s even an Elvis Presley license plate in there. He calls it the “flying Elvis” because it was flung Frisbee-style and hit someone in the head, he said.
A quick glance in the intake room Thursday revealed a BMX bicycle on the floor, a guitar on the counter and a keg in the corner.
Nothing is truly weird to her or Averbeck, but one of the more recent items that stuck out in Evans’ mind was a Trojan Vibrating Ring someone stole in January from a local store. Everyone in the department wanted to see it, but Evans rolled her eyes as she recalled the incident.
“I’ve been doing this so long, nothing surprises me anymore,” she said.
Averbeck said an item may be mundane and boring, but the story behind why it is evidence makes it interesting. A pop can is pretty unremarkable, but when it is used in a sexual assault, as one was recently, it becomes infinitely more compelling, Averbeck said.
“Anything you can think of, it’s probably been through (the evidence room),” he said.
Kevin Behr may be reached at (507) 453-3524 or at kbehr@winonadailynews.com.
El Dos wrote on Jan 17, 2009 10:24 AM: