FY 2018 DNA Capacity Enhancement and Backlog Reduction Program

The Office of Chief Medical Examiner, Department of Forensic Biology, serves as the public forensic laboratory for the City of New York and provides DNA testing on thousands of case submissions every year. In 2017 a total of 44,457 DNA samples were extracted, with STR profiles generated, analyzed, and reviewed. As a result, the Department uploaded 11,104 profiles into CODIS. During the same year there were 811 cold hits to offender matches, 289 case-to-case matches and 439 conviction matches.

To better serve customers in the criminal justice community the Department of Forensic Biology’s 2019 goals are to increase the current capacity and reduce the turnaround time and case backlog to 30 and 500 respectively. The lab has a current backlog of 2,515 and an average year-to-date turnaround time of 73 for all case types with approximately one month for homicides and sexual assaults. The Department has made significant progress within the last couple years towards this goal but with the increased in cases received in the laboratory, funding is needed to process the additional cases. NCA/NCF