Oregon State Police Forensics Unit Sees 2000th DNA Database Hit

The nationally accredited forensic laboratory system serving all state and local law enforcement agencies, medical examiners and prosecuting attorneys in Oregon.

Photos: OSP Forensic Services Division

(PORTLAND, Ore.) - Forensic evidence linking a convicted offender to a homicide became the 2000th DNA database hit reported by the Oregon State Police Forensic Laboratory DNA unit. The Oregon State Police Forensic Laboratory DNA unit recorded the 2000th DNA database hit November 20th. The first hit to the Combined DNA Index System (CODIS) happened August 1st 1994. Twelve years later the 1000th hit was recorded on September 28th 2004. Now, less than two years later, the DNA unit recorded the 2000th hit.

"The use of the Combined DNA Index System (CODIS) helps to identify suspects and relate unsolved crimes to provide leads to all law enforcement agencies in the State of Oregon," said Susan Torris Hormann, Supervisor of the DNA unit.

"The last 1,000 hits have provided investigative leads in 30 homicides, 74 rapes, 18 assaults, 82 robbery's, 9 arsons, 428 burglary's, a combined 272 leads for thefts and car thefts, and 87 other types of crimes."

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Since the first hit was recorded August 1st 1994, the following reflects how this forensic tool has increased identifying suspects during the last 13 years:

* August 1, 1994 – Hit #1

* September 28, 2004 – Hit #500

* January 18, 2006 – Hit #1,000

* January 22, 2007 – Hit #1,500

* November 20, 2007 – Hit #2,000

The 2007 Oregon Legislature approved over one million dollars to pay for analysis of approximately 24,000 backlogged convicted offender DNA samples.

Prior to this appropriation, the analysis of convicted offender DNA samples have been performed with the assistance of federal grant funds from the National Institute of Justice.

The Oregon State Police has received over 1.5 million dollars through these grants over the past seven years to analyze these convicted offender DNA samples.

Money has also been received from individuals and groups in Oregon who have donated through fund raising dinners (referred to as "DNA Dinners") and other efforts.

These dollars are solely dedicated for the purpose of analyzing convicted offender DNA samples.

As of October 2007, the Oregon State Police DNA database contains approximately 82,000 convicted offender samples and 5,000 forensic evidence samples. The National DNA database contains 5 million convicted offender samples and 190,000 forensic evidence samples.

The Oregon State Police Forensic Services Division is a nationally accredited forensic laboratory system serving all state and local law enforcement agencies, medical examiners and prosecuting attorneys in Oregon. Providing the State's only full service forensic laboratory system, the OSP Forensic Services Division also performs forensic analysis on criminal cases for the defense upon a court order.

Source: Oregon State Police Forensics Division

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