It could be up to a year before the new property room is fully functional. It could take that long to transfer the some 500,000 pieces of evidence that are currently stored in the old property room. Houston Police Chief Harold Hurtt calls it an investment and a giant step forward for law enforcement.
It is a brand new $13 million state of the art property room with all of the bells and whistles, and a stark contrast to the outdated, dilapidated old building the Houston Police Department has been using to store evidence since the late 1970s.
"That was a nightmare," Chief Hurtt said. "This is a dream come true."
From missing guns to 280 boxes of evidence that were misfiled and suddenly discovered, to concerns about the conditions inside and how they may have been compromising the integrity of the evidence stored, the property room's past has been rocky. The new 59,000 square foot facility boasts a modern security system where evidence will be stored, tagged, electronically coded, and tracked, a climate-controlled freezer to house DNA evidence that's three times bigger than the old one, and moveable high density shelving.
"Having evidence of crime and evidence of crime that has a proper chain of custody that has been properly stored that could be retrieved when ready for trial is indispensable," Mayor Bill White said.
Whether this new property room will erase the mistakes and embarrassments of the past remains to be seen, but the H.P.D. and city officials remain hopeful. They see it as a giant step in the right direction towards maintaining the public's confidence and trust in the criminal justice system and in the Police Department.
"We're very confident," Chief Hurtt said. "We have a captain here that is very dedicated to make sure this works. We have supervision in place."
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