City of Charleston Police Department's Forensic Services Division-Maintaining Quality Digital Examinations

The goals of this project proposal are to increase forensic service capacity and decrease turnaround times for South Carolina’s only accredited state/local digital evidence laboratory.

The City of Charleston Police Department’s (CPD) Forensic Service Division (FSD) digital examiners extract valuable evidence from a variety of devices. With the right technology and training, examiners are able to access throw phones, smart phones, tablets, e-readers, mass storage devices, and GPS navigators. For brevity, examiners use the term mobile devices. The Digital Evidence Unit (DEU) of the CPD-FSD has witnessed a dramatic increase in mobile device submissions. From 2014-2016, the DEU’s specimen counts increased from 333 to 472, or by 41.7%. The CPD-FSD urgently needs equipment and training to keep pace with the growing volume of digital forensic submissions.

Activities: With Coverdell support, the CPD-FSD will purchase two Cellebrite UFED upgrades at a competitive price, certify two FSD employees on digital examinations, and purchase data bags and cages that would increase the security of seized cellular data. About the Applicant: The CPD-FSD is an ASCLD/LAB-International accredited laboratory, certified in the fields of crime scene processing, digital evidence/multimedia examination, controlled substance analysis, fire debris analysis, serology, latent recovery, latent identification (including AFIS), and photography. The project goals are perfectly aligned with the FSD’s Quality Policy and the objectives of the Paul Coverdell Forensic Science Improvement Grant Program. The members of the CPD-FSD are committed to continued quality assurance, scientific reliability and criminal justice.

ca/ncf