National Institute of Justice Congressionally Directed Awards

The Mississippi Crime Laboratory System's mission is to provide a full range of forensic services to law enforcement agencies throughout the state. These services consist of controlled substance identification, latent print examinations and comparisons, fire debris analysis, toxicology examinations, and DNA testing. Currently the laboratory is unable to provide a number of the forensic services required by the Criminal Justice System of the state in the time frame that is needed. The primary reason for this situation is a backlog of unworked cases. In order to provide a timely response to the demands of the criminal justice system, the Mississippi Crime Laboratory must reduce the backlog of unworked cases and decrease the turn-around time on new cases coming into the laboratory.

nca/ncf