Crime scene investigators overworked, understaffed
Putting in long hours to help solve increases
Police car sirens, yellow crimescene tape and detectives asking questions are images that come to mind when people think about crime scenes.
But a group of people who operate behind those scenes are just as crucial to the investigation of homicides and other crimes around Columbus.
The men and women who gather and process evidence in the evidence technician and crime scene search units see much of the same trauma as responding officers and detectives. They arrive at scenes at all hours of the day or night with the hopes of finding the right clues to hold someone accountable.
Two of those women – evidence technician Deborah Lanata and crime scene Det. Suzanne Nissley – spoke with The Dispatch about their career paths to become evidence technicians
and the impact the city’s rising number of homicides and other violent crimes have on their units.
From patrol officer to detective
Nissley worked as a patrol officer for more than two decades before moving to the crime scene search unit in 2013. She said she had originally joined the department for the same reason many officers do, wanting to help other people, but got burnt out.
“You get kind of frustrated after 23and-one-half years on the street. You see the front end of it, you make the arrests, you do the enforcement actions,” Nissley said. “There’s not a lot of gratification for the work that you put in.”
Nissley wanted to move to a role as a detective, but did not know exactly what she wanted to do. She had always enjoyed the scientific and forensic aspects of investigation and had been a childhood fan of the TV show, “Quincy, M.E.,” about a Los Angeles county medical examiner (actor Jack Klugman) investigating deaths.
After some encouragement from her late husband and a female detective in the crime scene unit who Nissley admired, Nissley made the leap to become a detective and hasn’t looked back. She has recruited two of her former partners to join her in the unit.
“This is one of the few places in the department where we pretty much always get to be the good guys,” she said. “People are happy to see us show up because we’re going to be part of solving the crime.”
The crime scene search unit primarily deals with cases involving a crime against a person, so detectives like Nissley can respond to cases such as an armed robbery, sexual assault, non-fatal shooting or a homicide.
With more than 140 homicides reported so far this year, as well as an increase in non-fatal shootings, Nissley said the toll has been felt by the unit, particularly when family members of a victim are at the scene. Processing scenes, especially homicides, can take several hours. The larger the scene, the longer the time frame, Nissley said.
Detectives were at Bicentennial Park, where 16-year-old Olivia Kurtz was shot
in May and five others were wounded, for more than 24 hours processing evidence.
“We try to take great care, put up screens so people aren’t gawking or taking pictures and try to shield the families as much as we can,” Nissley said. “It is traumatic for them and we know that. We try to be thoughtful of the fact that they are there and not be blatant in bringing out anything visible that might be offensive to them.”
The reward of seeing an arrest or conviction in a case makes it worth it to Nissley though, especially in cases where cross-team investigation has a hand.
In a recent case, Lanata and Nissley worked together to tie a stolen vehicle Lanata processed to video of the suspects stealing another vehicle. Nissley recognized the ammunition found in the vehicle, which was not a type normally seen and had been used in a recent homicide. The two women were able to take all the evidence to detectives, who were able to pursue the leads and identify a potential homicide suspect.
Lanata, whose father was a Columbus police officer, had worked in a variety of temporary jobs at the Division of Police through high school and while in college at Ohio University, where she got a degree that she thought would lead her into a career in journalism. But after several years of bouncing around to other jobs and trying to figure out what she
really wanted to do, Lanata became a fingerprint technician for Columbus police.
After four and a half years in that role, in November 1999, Lanata applied for an opening as an evidence technician.
“I put in my resume thinking they’re never going to hire me because I’m a girl and have no previous law enforcement experience,” Lanata said.
At the time, the position had never been held by a woman or by someone who was not a sworn police officer.
Lanata got the job after what she called the “best interview of her life” and has stayed in that role for more than two decades. She is one of six civilian employees who primarily deal with gathering fingerprint and DNA evidence in property-related crimes, such as burglaries, stolen cars and other thefts.
But the technicians were also recently trained to gather all the division’s video evidence – doubling, or in some cases tripling, their workload.
Lanata said the unit could really use double the staff it currently has.
“We just keep running and running, and we’re exhausted,” she said. “It’s really a Band-aid on a gaping bullet wound.”
‘This isn’t CSI on TV’
The problem is exacerbated when vacations, illnesses or military leave further reduce the amount of people able to respond to scenes.
“I ended up with 43 hours of overtime in a check in July,” Lanata said. “That’s probably the amount of overtime I had the year before. It nearly killed me those two weeks, but when the lieutenant’s calling and saying, ‘We need video out of this homicide’ and you’re the person who’s got to go, you’ve got to go.”
Nissley said her unit, which has 16 detectives and three sergeants spread out over multiple shifts, has a slightly more manageable workload, but with rising homicide numbers and an increase in the number of non-fatal shootings, it’s not uncommon to be called in early or have to work late.
“The overtime and the long hours get to you after a little while, but it is that end result that keeps you going,” she said. “It’s somebody’s loved one that had something horrible happen to them or maybe lost a life. That’s what keeps you going because you’re helping some family get justice or closure.”
Lanata said there’s also a unique opportunity in her specific role – which involves going out in some cases after officers or detectives have left to talk with victims directly and try to get fingerprints off important items.
She said in one instance, she was sitting on the kitchen floor of a home on the Northeast Side, trying to get fingerprints off a television as a young girl kept watching her, fascinated by the dark dust used.
“This is what I like doing, I love changing hearts and minds and showing kids how we do things,” Lanata said. “Being able to tell that mom, ‘Hey, we got a couple fingerprint lifts’ and showing them what we can and can’t do and trying to talk to them ... some of it is (public relations). This isn’t CSI on TV.”
Training to be a crime scene detective usually takes six to eight weeks and for Columbus, the detectives must be sworn police officers. For evidence technicians, the training can beas short as two weeks or up to several months, depending on a person’s background, prior experience and education.
For both Nissley and Lanata, being involved in the investigation of crime scenes is exactly the route they know they were destined to take in their careers.
“If I had it to do it over again, I’d do it sooner because I love what I do,” Nissley said. bbruner@dispatch.com @bethany_bruner