TO: Mayor Thomas J. Weisner
FROM: Lt. William Hull # 954, Aurora Police Department
DATE: 11/04/13
SUBJECT: title
Resolution Authorizing the Re-Hiring of Certified Fingerprint Analysts Julie Smith and Gina Minetti as Contractual Consultants for the Purpose of Fingerprint Analysis and Identification for the Aurora Police Department.
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PURPOSE:
To request authorization from the Aurora City Council to re-hire certified fingerprint analysts Julie Smith and Gina Minetti for the purpose of conducting fingerprint analysis and identification as part of the Department's continuing program to maintain a complete in-house fingerprint capability for the Aurora Police Department.
BACKGROUND:
Formerly, for all crimes occurring in Aurora (excepting those that occur in DuPage County), the Aurora Police Department had submitted fingerprint evidence to the Illinois State Police's Joliet Crime Lab (JCL) for analysis and identification. Due to overstretched resources and heavy caseloads at the JCL, it currently takes approximately 12 months for them to process and return fingerprint evidence from crime scenes submitted for Automated Fingerprint Identification System (AFIS) comparison.
As we waited for our AFIS submissions to come back, the citizens of Aurora suffered needless victimization at the hands of criminals, often times felons, who remained unidentified and free to continue their criminal pursuits while fingerprint evidence that could link them to previous crimes was waiting processing by the JCL. This continued victimization has monetary costs as well as psychological costs that negatively impact the quality of Aurora citizenry.
Fingerprint evidence is still amongst the strongest of all types of evidence, it is possible to get charges authorized against an offender on the basis of fingerprint evidence alone. In order to better serve the public by combatting crime and removing criminals from the streets of Aurora at the earliest possible opportunity, the Department developed its own complete in-house fingerprint capability to include lifting fingerprints, submitting them through AFIS, making identifications, and being able to testify in court to those identifications. Being able to make these quick identifications has resulted in career criminals being identified and removed from our streets before they have the opportunity to victimize our citizens over and over again.
Research into what was needed in order to establish an in-house AFIS capability showed that two analysts were needed, as in order to establish absolute reliability in identifications, one certified analyst must verify the identification of another. Misidentifications would serve to undermine the credibility of our programs before the courts, and could also incur liability for the City. After analyzing various options to obtain the services of two analysts, the Police Department determined that hiring already trained and certified people to perform fingerprint analysis and identification on a contractual basis was the quickest and most cost-effective way to establish an in-house AFIS capability. Other options that were ruled out were hiring full or part-time analysts, or committing Police Department personnel to the lengthy training and certification process that would be needed to perform this task.
On 12/22/2009, the City Council approved the purchase of AFIS equipment from the NEC Corporation of America for this purpose, and on 03/23/2010, the City Council adopted Resolution R10-109-F10.042 authorizing the hiring of two certified fingerprint analysts as contractual consultants to conduct fingerprint analysis and identification. Fingerprint analysts, Julie Smith and Gina Minetti, were contracted and cleared to perform this work for the department beginning 11/30/2010.
Smith and Minetti performed fingerprint analysis for the Department during December of 2010, February through December of 2011, all of 2012 and 2013. During this time they have been assigned 551 cases, examined 1481 fingerprint lifts and were able to make identifications of 532 people. They have proved themselves to be highly competent and dependable workers, and met all of the requirements of their job descriptions and the expectations of the Department. In some cases, they had an identification within hours, instead of the 12 months it may have taken the crime lab to make an identification.
DISCUSSION:
Based on the proven work performance and success rates already established by Julie Smith and Gina Minetti, the Department would like to have their contracts renewed for the calendar year 2014 and 2015. Those contracts have been structured based on the volume of work we have for them and the rate at which they were able to process it during the time they worked for us in 2010 through 2013. That analysis showed that they will need to work at least 6 hours a piece each week, up to 10 hours a piece a week. Their rate of pay will be $125.00 per hour, subject to an annual maximum of $60,000.00 each. They are only contacted when there is work for them to do, so the City will not incur any costs if there is none. Their contracts (attached) have been reviewed and approved by the City's Corporation Counsel and Human Resources, and are now presented to the City Council for approval.
The 2014 budget will provide for this project in account 101-3536-421.32-20.
IMPACT STATEMENT:
Fingerprint evidence is still amongst the strongest of all types of evidence, it is possible to get charges authorized against an offender on the basis of fingerprint evidence alone. In order to better serve the public by combatting crime and removing criminals from the streets of Aurora at the earliest possible opportunity, the Department developed its own complete in-house fingerprint capability to include lifting fingerprints, submitting them through AFIS, making identifications, and being able to testify in court to those identifications. Being able to make these quick identifications has resulted in career criminals being identified and removed from our streets before they have the opportunity to victimize our citizens over and over again.
RECOMMENDATIONS:
I am recommending that the City Council authorize the re-hiring of Julie Smith and Gina Minetti as contractual consultants for the purpose of fingerprint analysis and identification in order to continue the Department's established success in completely processing all fingerprint evidence in-house.
cc: Alderman O'Connor, Chairman
Alderman Mervine
Alderman Peters, Alternate