This month we will start right off with standards for general property room layout and design. The topic will be continued for at least one more issue to present specific standards and suggestions the "big three" property types that most frequently cause problems: firearms, narcotics, currency.

• The property should be entered into storage in a uniform manner. Methods for preparing, labeling, and recording property should be established. Responsibility for these tasks may be assigned. CALEA 84. 1.1

• The size of the property room is influenced, of course, by the size of the agency and its workload, but when a systematic disposal / release program is used, the size of the room(s) can be restricted to lesser dimensions. One of the most important aspects in the design is the need to closely control certain items, such as guns, currency, jewelry and narcotics. POST Managing Property In Law Enforcement Agencies, Page 3, 1984

• Some items of in-custody property, by their very nature, require extra protection, security, and handling precautions. Items such as money, precious metals, jewelry, firearms, and drugs are some that should be considered. The agency may set its own guidelines and determine the degree of extra security required. Providing locked containers, such as vaults, lockers, or interior rooms, should satisfy the requirements of the standard. Further restrictions on access to certain areas also enhance security precautions.  It is not necessary, however, for each type of item to have its own separate secure area. CALEA 84.1.2 

• Firearms, Narcotics, and Cash should be segregated from other property. An ideal option would be within a separate locked and alarmed room totally within the confines of the property room. CAPE - Property Manual, Page 3, 11/1l/95.

Special security needs - Money and other valuables, narcotics, and guns should each have a special storage area. They are the most valuable for their size, and almost every effort to compromise a property room has one of these items as its target.

Property for Safekeeping - These items need to be located close to the public counter and the property intake area for easy access. These items have short storage turnaround, and many are released to their owners prior to the review time.

Found Property - Found Property has the same needs as Property for Safekeeping, but should be kept separately from it for ease of management. Property room staff working the counter or telephone should review this property periodically to better respond to inquiries.

Homicide Evidence - Evidence stored on homicide cases should be stored away from other property. Preferably it should be substantially removed from active evidence, to minimize any contact with it, which reduces the chance of any error in handling it. Keep in mind that guns, money and narcotics need to be stored in their specialty areas, but the principle of isolating homicide evidence in an area less likely to be disturbed still stands.

Special hazard needs - Ventilation is o special concern with narcotics. Flammable material or fireworks are often entered as evidence. With the proliferation of various hazardous materials it is likely that even more deadly items will be seized as evidence in the near future.

Special physical needs - Some items need special handling such as refrigeration or freezing based on their fragile nature, such as sexual assault evidence, and others need special treatment based on their shape or bulk, such as bicycles, vehicle parts, pallets, garden and construction equipment, etc. Providing for all special needs is critical whether due to the fragile nature of evidence of just its sheer bulk. Whether through special shelving, or through a grid painted on a large open floor area, the special physical needs of bulky property must be considered in the layout of a new facility.

Being able to specifically identify and document each storage location used by the Department is a critical step in the evidence function. All rooms, bays, bins, shelves, racks and containers need to have a clearly readable address. Most Property Specialists become quite familiar with their environment, and have no doubt about where something is that is "in the old cabinet in the back room." Unfortunately, relief personnel and supervisors must also work in the same environment. Every effort needs to be made to guarantee that all locations are properly marked. Using an organized numbering system that is specific is a critical element of the system. If changes ever have to be made, it is imperative that the old numbers be completely removed and all applicable documentation be changed.

There are at least three basic concepts for storing items on shelves. Almost all property rooms use one, or a combination, of these three. 

1. Space assigned by date - This system assigns one or more shelves to each day. Property is easy to find if you know the day on which it was booked, but it doesn't allow for efficient storage of bulk items. It does not keep evidence of a case together if it is booked on different days. It does not effectively use storage, as some shelves may be almost empty, and some may be overstuffed, but property does not have to be moved. A shelf will not be recycled until the completion of the cycle, even if it is completely empty.

2. Property stored consecutively (usually with "condensing" and standardized packaging sizes) - Starting at one end of the shelf, you store property in the order in which it is booked. This uses space efficiently because there are no spaces left, except for storing bulk items which don't fit the shelving. As spaces are vacated through the release of property, remaining property can be "condensed" by just sliding it toward the start point to use the freed space. Finding an item requires checking the item tags, because the shelf cannot be labeled to indicate either the date booked or the item tags, as the property is constantly being moved during condensing. This method is extremely efficient when dealing with standardized packaging containers

3. Coded storage locations – This system generally requires a computer tracking system, but can be done manually with sufficient staffing. This uses space efficiently, because you can have large sections of shelving of various heights and depths, and select locations based on the best fit. It does not allow you to look at the "old case" section, as they are intermingled with newer evidence. Remember that narcotics, guns and currency still have their own secure locations.

If the coded storage location system is continued, it is strongly recommended that color coding by year be implemented. When attempting to retrieve property on a shelf that contains property from a variety of different years, it speeds up the process to be able to look only at the color of tags which would designate the appropriate year in which the property was seized.

Utilization of a computer database with bar-code and assigned storage locations allows you to be highly efficient in inventories. You can search and sort as with any computer database program. You can print a list of everything that is supposed to be on a particular shelf or in a particular room. You can print out the locations of all property booked in 1989. You can print out a list of all currency cases. The options are endless.

A suggested scenario for developing such an overall organization pattern would be as follows:

First, review the historical record of the types and quantities of evidence that are regularly booked into the property system. For example, most property room personnel would agree that a large percentage of the property and evidence items stored are relatively small in size. A general guideline based on experience would be that about half of most inventories are items that could be stored in a series of uniform sized envelopes and small containers. Obviously there are significant exceptions, but design should be based on the majority, with allowances for the exception.

Second, designate particular areas of the storage facility for particular types of evidence. Examples would be putting the sections for Found Property and Property for Safekeeping near the office, as most of those property types are released and it is a short turnaround item compared to evidence. Place homicide evidence in the farthest location, as it is kept indefinitely in many cases and is seldom accessed.

Third, decide on some standard packaging options and shelving / container combinations. If shelving is fixed, design your containers around the shelving sizes. If shelving is adjustable, use containers that are standard sizes to minimize cost by purchasing them in quantity. If three to four standard size envelopes (see photo) were designated, then the appropriate containers, drawers, and bins could be designed to store the selected envelopes in specific shelving locations.

By developing the packaging standard around the shelving and bin configuration, or visa versa, a Department can maximize the efficiency of property storage, and minimize the effort it takes to store and retrieve it. The envelopes would then be filed in case number order within the selected size box, bin, drawer, or file cabinet. For example, if an officer books in a single driver's license, it would go in the smallest envelope (which we will call an "A" envelope), and be placed into evidence. The Property Specialist would catalog the item, and place the “A” envelope into an “A” box, bin, drawer, or file cabinet.  In the event multiple items are booked are too numerous or too large to fit into one of the standard envelopes, then the option of a ‘banker’s box” should be considered.

Obviously not everything will fit in the selected envelopes, but most agencies find that at least a third, and probably over half of the items that are currently in the property room could have been secured in uniform sized packages that could be stored in a more orderly fashion.  Also keep in mind that firearms, narcotics and money are excluded from this discussion, as they receive specialized treatment.

          This topic will continue in this column in the next issue of The Evidence Log ©.