STATE GETS MONEY FOR FIGHT AGAINST DRUGS

The Vermont Forensic Laboratory will get $500,000 in federal money to help
it handle a burgeoning number of drug cases.

The crime lab, which serves 92 local, state and federal law enforcement
agencies, reported a 400 percent increase in heroin cases over the past
year. Those cases, coupled with a number of murders at the end of 2000,
have spread laboratory resources thin.

Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., secured the money for the Waterbury lab.

Leahy is a senior member of the Senate Appropriations Committee and is
chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, which oversees the Department
of Justice. Leahy added the $500,000 to the DOJ's budget, which was
approved by the president Dec. 21.

"The crime lab is the crucial link between police work and successful
prosecutions," Leahy said.

The money will be used to replace aging lab equipment, and to buy machines
and other tools that analyze drugs and evidence - including hair, heroin,
fingerprints and DNA.

Leahy said the equipment will ensure better evidence results for use in
court cases. Leahy, who served for more than eight years as a state's
attorney in Chittenden County, said forensics always play a key role in
prosecution.

"I know how difficult it is to prosecute cases, especially complex drug
cases, unless you have forensic evidence," he said.

When meeting with law enforcement agencies around the state, Leahy said,
the issue of the crime lab's limited resources kept coming up.

Dr. Eric Buel, director of the laboratory, said the equipment the lab now
uses is 10 years old. The equipment usually has a life span of seven years,
he said. "It gets old and breaks down more often."

The lab analyzes evidence collected by police at crime scenes and from
suspicious fires, and prepares the results for court proceedings. If
something can't be analyzed with the equipment there, it's sent to the FBI.

Some of the new equipment lab officials plan to buy will have DNA testing
capabilities. Buel said there's a freezer full of evidence on unsolved
crimes in the lab. Some of the new equipment could help lab employees
compare that evidence to similar cases and possibly make connections
between them, he said.

"There's a lot of things we'd like to do here," Buel said.

The new instrumentation will have software and new computers that will be
faster and easier to use, he said. Some other new instruments will enhance
machines already in place. Additions to the fingerprinting tools will
enable lab workers' ability to lift prints from places they couldn't before.

Buel said he would like to implement a computer system that would track
evidence information, a process that's now done on paper.

Before the equipment can be purchased, Buel said, the lab administration
has to accept the grant, which may happen in April or May. He said the new
equipment could be in place by this summer.

"We have a lot of legwork to do. We need to look at some manufacturers and
see who would do the best job for the best price," he said. "You want to
keep Vermont safe. You need prosecutors and cops on the road, but all the
evidence that gets collected? Before it goes to court, it needs to be
analyzed."

Vermont State Police Lt. Thomas Hanlon is assigned to the lab and is in
charge of crime scene investigations. He said the new equipment will help
law enforcement officers get a faster turnaround time on tests.

Hanlon said newer equipment would enable lab workers to perform more
quantitative tests on drug purity levels.

But even with new equipment, Buel said, there would still be a backlog in
drug testing.

"Testing drugs will still be a process. None of this stuff is like a
sausage machine where you just crank it out," he said.

Buel said each sample would still need to be tested separately. He said new
software would shave time off some former manual processes.

"Our facility is small, so we can't put a whole lot more new
instrumentation in the space," he said.

But Buel said something is already in the works for a new place. However,
that may take up to five years.

This money pushed Leahy's total drug funding over the $1 million mark since
late last year.

That money includes:

$400,000 to create three state drug task forces and add five officers to
the program.

$150,000 to the Vermont Coalition of Teen Centers, which helps prevent
teens from getting involved with drugs.

$100,000 for the Vermont Department of Health to plan treatment programs
for young adults.

"They're all connected. You have to have treatment, prevention and law
enforcement ability to do something if there is drug use and drug
trafficking," Leahy said Wednesday.

He said he plans to continue following up on the outcomes of the grants
with the respective agencies.

"I'll follow along, and if they need more, I'll get them more," Leahy said.
"I'm going to continue the kinds of meetings I've had to get a better sense
of things that might help them."