OSU refurbishes old fire station for crime scene training laboratory

The building in west Tulsa housed a fire station from 1958 to 1990.

TULSA — An abandoned fire station in west Tulsa is returning to the world of public safety.

Oklahoma State University Center for Health Sciences is transforming the old building near Southwest Boulevard and 17th Street into a crime scene investigation laboratory for students in its forensic sciences graduate program.

The school purchased the building at 1712 S Phoenix Ave. during a city of Tulsa auction for $135,000 in 2014.

Total cost of the project — scheduled to be completed in May — is $325,000.

Once complete, the facility will be used to train graduate students in crime-scene investigation techniques and to provide training for area law enforcement officers.

“You can teach students until you’re blue in the face with textbooks and PowerPoint presentations but until they get experience lugging their equipment into a crime scene and placing it in a way where it’s convenient and doesn’t disturb the scene, until they know what the mechanics they’ve learned look like, they’re not fully trained,” said Robert Allen, chairman and director of the School of Forensic Sciences at the OSU Health Sciences Center.

One room of the building will be coated with epoxy paint so the students can practice analyzing blood splatter and detecting other bodily fluids.

Garage doors, which were walled over from the original building, are being returned to allow students to practice vehicle investigations.

The building can also be used to train canine units.

“It’s going to have a multi-functional use and in our opinion all those uses are going to benefit the city of Tulsa and state of Oklahoma making the places we live safer and more secure,” Allen said.

The renovation work in the building, which housed Fire Station 6 from 1958 to 1990, includes wiring the facility for audio and video, which will allow students to review their work for what they did right and ways they might have contaminated the crime scene.

“We’re really trying to keep the space as raw as we possibly can. The reality is, in the dilapidated shape it’s in now, it’s more of an example of a crime scene then it ever will be once we’re finished,” Allen said.

Jackie Smithson, crime scene investigator with the Broken Arrow Police Department, said the lab will provide great opportunities to both students and current law enforcement and first responders.

“Right now, there’s not a place in northeast Oklahoma for law enforcement officers to get hands-on opportunities in crime scene investigations,” he said. “There are great classes that are available but this will provide a lab setting and a controlled environment.”

The building has been deserted for years and it was used as a construction office when the Center for Health Sciences building was being built.

“The addition of the crime scene investigation laboratory demonstrates our strong commitment to providing cutting-edge education for all students,” said Kayse Shrum, OSU Center for Health Sciences president.