New Crime Scene Trailers Ready for the Field

SOUTH CHARLESTON – Four new crime scene trailers have been equipped and are ready for use. The trailers are a part of the West Virginia State Police’s Crime Scene Response Teams. The addition of these trailers, along with the two current crime scene trucks, allows a mobile unit to be placed in each Troop in the state.

The West Virginia State Police Crime Scene Response Team was formed in January 2002 in order to provide high quality police service to the state of West Virginia. At the time, two teams were established, one in the north and one in the south. The teams consisted of eight uniformed Troopers who received specialized training by the State Police Forensic Laboratory in various areas of developing crime scenes.

Due to the response and need for the units, four additional teams were trained in the fall of 2002. Each Troop (or region) then had their own response team. These teams have processed over 80 crime scenes and utilized approximately 4735 man-hours. The teams have received training in specialized photography and fingerprint collection techniques, blood identification, diagramming and other crime scene processing techniques.

In October of this year, the teams will be expanded to include seven more Troopers, bring the total to 31 Troopers. With the addition of the four new crime scene trailers, each Troop Response Team will now have a vehicle in which to process crime scenes. In the past, two crime scene trucks were responsible for the entire state and had to be shared by the individual Troops.

The teams are available for all law enforcement agencies throughout the state. The scope of their response, however, has been limited to violent crimes such as homicides, sexual assaults and kidnapping.

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