Fabulous facility for fighting crime

Denver area’s new stateoftheart regional lab opens

Three years ago, Arapahoe County Sheriff Dave Walcher and his counterpart in Douglas County, Sheriff Tony Spurlock, were having coffee, discussing the challenges they had with public safety, particularly forensic work.

Wait times for DNA analysis from the state lab could take up to 18 months in some instances. Samples for smaller crimes, such as property or car thefts, would often get pushed down the queue, stuck behind more serious cases from across Colorado.

For Walcher and Spurlock, something needed to be done.

Wednesday afternoon, on a large patch of dirt tucked behind Centennial Airport, that conversation over coffee came to fruition. Officials from Arapahoe County and Douglas County, the city of Aurora and the district attorney, unveiled a new, stateoftheart regional crime lab.

The $13.5 million, 26,500squarefoot Unified Metropolitan Forensic Crime Lab will serve 1 million people in the 18th Judicial District — which includes Douglas, Arapahoe, Elbert and Lincoln counties — plus Aurora. It is the largest judicial district in Colorado, and 45 percent more populous than Denver.

And now it finally has its own fullservice crime lab, complete with laboratories to analyze DNA, run fingerprints, compare bullets, identify unknown substances and much more.

“This will be probably one of the greatest crimefighting tools that has come to the 18th Judicial District in a long time,” Spurlock said.

With the ability to use the regional lab instead of waiting on the CBI, officials are predicting a sea change in efficiency.

“This will serve this entire judicial district in solving crimes faster, clearing people faster, putting bad people in jail faster and being able to solve more crimes,” Walcher said.

The lab will be staffed with 31 employees from the Arapahoe County Sheriff’s Office, the Aurora Police Department and Douglas County Sheriff’s Office.

The costshare plan for the lab will draw about $23.7 million from Douglas County over a 20year period. Nearly $16 million will come from Arapahoe Coun

Hyoung Chang, The Denver Post This is the instruments room at the new Unified Metropolitan Forensic Crime Lab, which will serve Douglas and Arapahoe counties and the city of Aurora. The lab, which cost $13.5 million to build and covers 26,500 square feet, opened Wednesday.

Hyoung Chang, The Denver Post Crime scene investigator Andrea Smith of the Douglas County Sheriff ’s Office explains the lab’s Automated Finger Print System on Wednesday.