Don’t Waste Time and Resources on a System that Doesn’t Work for You
According to the National Institute of Justice, the average criminal case can easily generate 1.5TB of digital evidence content. Take a moment to consider that: 1.5 terabytes of digital evidence content for every case. That’s the equivalent of 50,000 images, 375,000 4mg audio files, or over 300+ stored seasons of your favorite Netflix series. Then multiply that by the number of cases the average police precinct handles each year.
Is your current evidence management system able to securely collect, process, and store this much digital content? If you’re still relying on last century’s methods, your organization is opening themselves up to a number of risks, including lost or inadmissible evidence, corrupt files, disrupted chain of custody, and data breaches.
The right technology is essential to managing your digital evidence. But what exactly does that look like? Consider the following as you search for a solution that works for your organization:
Can you collect and process evidence in any location?
It's important that officers are able to use photos, videos, and witnesses appropriately to verify the location, time, and other details surrounding the discovery and collection of evidence. How challenging is it for them to collect evidence in the field using your evidence management system? Can they upload the data easily from their phone, or do they need to go back to the office to process the evidence?
Is it easy to gather evidence from other sources?
Maybe you have footage of a car chase from the local news, or you need to capture a social media post sent to officers. Different formats need to be captured with a record of the complete metadata attached – is your evidence management system able to accomplish this?
Are you able to easily use, store, and integrate from established systems?
It can be a challenge pulling different tech systems with different requirements when the process isn’t cohesive or intuitive and can make it a liability to use that digital evidence. Digital evidence must have a clear, searchable, easy-to-understand path to one location, including integration into CAD, RMS, Bodycams, CCTVs, and Courts systems. The workflow needs to be easy to use throughout all actions.
Can you quickly catalog and search by case number and type?
All evidence needs to be properly saved and organized. There's little worse than finding evidence and failing to document it properly, rendering it potentially useless if tampering is suspected. All evidence needs to be organized and available by type, keyword, tags, or case number.
Can you easily do audits?
Maintaining and tracking chain of custody is not only needed; it’s required. It’s essential you have a system that tracks who has accessed each piece of evidence and when they accessed it. Preserving paperless evidence can be a challenge because, unlike physical evidence, it can be altered or deleted. Investigators need to be able to authenticate the evidence and provide documentation that tracks the evidence history from collection to final disposition.
Is it secure?
Keeping digital contents secure and ensuring only the right people have the right access at the right time should not be a time-consuming process. Look for an evidence management system that simplifies this process and other similar administrative actions.
Your digital evidence management system should allow your organization to create an entire digital ecosystem from capture to disposition of files from multiple sources such as cell phones, professional cameras, police car camera systems, and video surveillance cameras – all in one centralized repository.
