May 2020 | Vol. 6 Iss. 05
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WEST VALLEY CITY POLICE FORENSICS TEAM ENERGIZED BY NEW CRIME LAB By Darrell Kirby | d.kirby@mycityjournals.com
W
hen the West Valley City Police Department moved last fall from its old headquarters to a newly built facility a stone’s throw away, it was a major upgrade for the agency in many ways. Perhaps the biggest beneficiary of the relocation was the police department’s forensics unit. Older equipment and tight quarters made the processing and storage of evidence gathered from crime scenes limited at best in the windowless basement of the outdated structure. That sometimes increased the time and lowered the quality of investigations and created a sense of isolation. “We used to joke about the old ‘Twilight Zone’ and that we were going to come out one day and not know the whole world was gone,” said Amanda Bennett, forensics director for the police department. There are no likely planetary surprises at the forensics lab on the first floor of the new $25 million police building. The space is bright, climate-controlled, and is bordered on its west side by staff offices with windows. Bennett says one of the most appreciated additions to the new lab is a ballistics water tank for firearms testing. Spanning the length of several bathtubs, but deeper, the tank allows guns to be fired into the water at various angles to help determine the trajectory of bullets at a crime scene and any residues left when the weapons are discharged. That previously had to be done at a Salt Lake City police facility. “Just the logistics of packing up evidence, transporting it to another agency, checking it in there, test firing it, and bringing it back was time consuming and not very efficient,”
Firearms Examiner Robyn Ostby is happy to have a ballistics water tank on-site at the West Valley City Police Department. (Darrell Kirby/City Journals)
she said. The previous building had no private area to load or unThe new building has a garage where vehicles involved load evidence and equipment from police vehicles. It usually in crimes can be examined for evidence, something that was had to be done in public view in a parking lot. The new lab has done off-site in the past. “This allows us a controlled space to a gated, screened area for that procedure. bring those vehicles in to that’s close to our home base which “The old building was definitely not intended originally has all of our chemicals,” Bennett said. Continued page 8
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