Justification and organization of forensic investigation units

Justification of a Forensic Unit

Our Agency has just received $3 million grant from the federal government because of the efficient method that the unit employs in running the department. Additionally, the City Council has agreed to continue assisting the unit with additional funding at the end of the three years provided the department is productive and serve the citizens well. However, the department requires presenting a different budget from the previous budget. This proposal will create a new budget for the forensic unit to describe where all the funding will be allocated. The budget will consider the specialized personnel for the unit because smooth running of the unit depends on the specialized personnel.

Mission Statement of the Specialized Unit

The specialized forensic unit will deliver highest quality forensic services to all our customers, and our unit will deliver accurate service through analysis and the state of art technology. We will accomplish our mission using the highly skilled, innovative and unbiased professionals having high vision and integrity. We will also tailor our services to achieve the following mission:

To maximize the return on investment and forensic services.

To promote and enhance a healthy working environment.

To operate in a prepared, planned and proactive manner.

To meet the forensic service needs of our citizens and community

To secure the accreditation of LAB/ASCLD and in compliance with all oversight requirements.

To minimize turnaround time and backlogs.

To promote scientific operations with continuing education and by evaluating the current procedures.

Core Values

Our core values are to dedicate to professional service, fairness, and integrity in order to deliver expert testimony, report and information that are reliable, ethical and scientifically to our clients.

Development of a job task Analysis for the Specialized Unit

The specialized unit will carry out the investigative jobs with the application of modern science to arrive at the solutions to the crimes. Our tasks are also to focus on the preservation, retrieval, processing and documentation of physical evidences that are retrieved at the crime scenes. Moreover, our task will focus on some number of laboratory functions, which include video analysis and examination, recording and comparing latent fingerprints, diagramming major crash and crime scene. Since we will be operating with limited financial resources, we will not carry out all the forensic tasks, however, out specialized unit will assist in shooting reconstruction, death investigation, traffic fatalities, bloodstain analysis that involve criminal charges. Member of the specialized unit will also be trained to carry out the data retrieval tasks from computer, smart phones, cell phones, and other data and electronic storage devices that criminals use for their criminal activities. (Spence, Webster, & Connors, 2009, Victoria Police, 2013).

Developing Job Descriptions Specific to the Specialized Unit

The specific job of our specialized unit will focus on the detection of the criminals through collection of fingerprint. Moreover, we will train our staff to identify criminals through footwear expression. Our job specific job descriptions for our specialized unit will be as follows:

Criminal Identification: preparation of suspect facial composites based on the collection of witness descriptions. We will also focus on cranio-facial reconstruction with preparation of interactive evidence and graphic presentations.

Document Analysis: We will focus on the signature and handwriting comparisons; analysis of machine generated documents, and analysis documents for alterations.

Vehicle Examination: Analysis of suspect vehicles to establish original identity.

Development an Operational Budget for the Specialized Unit

The table 1 provides the operational budget for the specialized unit and the budget will cover all the specialized job functions that the unit will be carrying out. The budget of the administrative support units will be $510,000, while the fingerprint analysis job will have the budget of $446,000. The costs of training of the new and old staff will be approximately $95,000. The budget for the trace evidence analysis will be $455,000. The overall budget for the specialized unit will be $3 million.

Table 1: 2014 Operational budget for the specialized unit

Administrative Support Services

$510,000

Forensic Biology Unit

$530,000

Trace Evidence Analysis

$455,000

Fingerprinting Analysis

$446,000

Tool Mark and Firearms Examination

$460,000

Digital and Documents

$504,000

Staff Training

$95,000

Total

$3, 000,000

Summarize the Selection Process for members of the Specialized Unit

The department will select entry level and experienced professionals as member of the specialized unit. To be considered as a new member of the unit, the applicants should possess a university degree from the accredited universities in biological and physical sciences and law. However, an applicant having a degree in forensic science and Master degree will be given a special consideration. (Police Executive Research, 2002).

Moreover, the specialized unit will recruit the member from professionals having years of experience in forensic investigations. In the United States, there are several thousands of qualified individuals having professional experiences in different forensic investigations in different fields, which include computer science forensic, accounting forensic and medical forensic. Moreover, the department will recruit member of the unit from the member of police staff who have accumulated years of experience in police investigations. The unit will consider a member of police staff having a record of accomplishment in a crime investigation. More importantly, all the entry-level staff and professional staff will undergo a training to acquire a professional certification in forensic science.

Developing the Unit Justifications

The development of information technology has opened the door for the new type of sophisticated crimes where increasingly number of people is using the internet and other IT tools to perpetuate the IT crimes, cybercrimes and accounting frauds. Within the last few years, corporate organizations have lost several billion of dollars from these types of frauds. Based on the sophisticated nature of these frauds, the traditional police forces do not possess the specialized skill to track down the perpetrators of these crimes. The nature of these crimes call for the creation of the specialized forensic unit whose the staff will be specially trained to track down the perpetuators of these crimes. The specialized forensic unit will be equipped with different specialized technology to find the solution to the crime, which will bring sanity to the police department. (Bureau of Forensic Service, 2009).

Present and explain a proposal for a specialized unit

This paper proposes the creation of a specialized unit based on the increase on the sophisticated crimes perpetuated by criminals in the United States. For example, the cyber criminals are continuing attacking the information systems of both corporate and government organizations stealing sensitive information worth billions of dollars. Thus, the proposal will provide solution to all crimes within 3 years and bring sanity to the community.