Oregon crime lab hits milestone in DNA testing

PORTLAND — When the characters on the "CSI" television shows ask for a DNA test, the results come back before the next commercial. Real cops and scientists in Oregon wish it were so.

Because of budget cuts, officers usually have to wait at least four months to get something tested at the Oregon State Police crime lab, be it a bloodstained shirt from a homicide or a cigarette butt left at a burglary scene, say state police.

When the results do come back, they often clear suspects.

That was the case in January when the crime lab reached a milestone: its 1,000th DNA "hit" matching an unsolved crime to a profile in the state database of genetic samples. Only eight other states have reached that milestone.

The hit came in a case that began late last summer when Portland detectives sealed a piece of clothing in a brown paper bag and sent it to the lab for a DNA test.

Police won't say what the garment was, except that it was the only thing left behind by an armed robber. After months of focusing on a suspect, investigators wanted to be sure they had the right guy.

In late January, the detectives got their answer: Their suspect didn't do it, but the evidence pointed to a felon the authorities hadn't considered.

"They had the case all ready to go," said Brian Ostrom, the DNA unit's supervisor. "But we had to tell them, 'Sorry, you've got the wrong man.' "

Given Oregon's size, forensics experts say they are amazed at how fast the state has joined the 1,000-hit club. The other states, including Florida, New York and California, are much larger.

Washington is at 326 hits.

"In the forensics world, 1,000 hits is a big deal," said Lynne McIntyre, director of the Washington State Patrol crime lab in Seattle. "It's the point where we realize the database we invested time and money in is really up and working and solving crimes."

Ostrom estimates that 20 percent of the Oregon lab's hits have absolved suspects. State police say, though, that they don't know of an instance in which a suspect has been jailed only to be cleared later through DNA analysis.

The Legislature sliced the staff statewide from 135 to 50 people in 2003. Today, there are 109, but the workload has increased as police become more reliant on DNA. Investigators also have opened dusty evidence lockers to submit evidence from unsolved cases that have haunted them for years.

"Our success has definitely created more work," said David Schmierbach, director of the state-police Forensic Services Division.

A 2001 law requires all convicted felons to submit DNA material for a state database, so more than 20,000 cards containing the genetic fingerprints of convicted felons remain stacked up, waiting to be entered into the system, with 1,000 new samples arriving every month.

"Here they are," Ostrom said as he stepped into a cavernous freezer filled with the boxes of DNA samples, mostly from saliva swabs from prison inmates, parolees and other offenders. "We seem to always have this revolving backlog of 20,000."

Meanwhile, the lab's scientists are attempting to triage boxes of evidence from 640 active cases dating to May 2005.

Two weeks ago, Portland police announced they had used DNA to link the 1980 murder of Cherie Ayers to Randall Woodfield, the notorious "I-5 killer."

Other cases cracked by the database include the 2002 hit that linked rapist Ladon Stephens to the rape and murder of 14-year-old Melissa Bittler in Portland, and the 2004 hit linking two men to the 1994 stabbing death of Milwaukie mother Susan Rae Hosler.