By Eli Brand | WDSU | August 2, 2022
NEW ORLEANS — The New Orleans Police Department has hired five new crime scene investigators. This increases their investigators from nine up to 14. They say this will help them cut down evidence processing times and help with burnout in the department.
“Think about coming to a scene and you’re overworked, the burnout. We want to decrease that burnout. This is an opportunity to decrease that burnout when you have more personnel. There are three platoons, we want to make sure they’re fully staffed,” said interim crime lab director Sgt. Troy Dickerson.
These new hires come as the city of New Orleans has now seen 170 homicides in 2022 through the month of July. This is an over 130% increase from 2019, according to the Metropolitan Crime Commission.
One of the new crime scene investigators is Ashley Brown, who is from the Crescent City.
“Justice starts with you. If you want to make a difference and you want your city to be better and you want to make a difference it starts with you. So, we all can be a part of this if we work together and stand as a community,” said Brown.
A homicide detective and sergeant with the department also took part in the training, which will help them communicate with the lab from the field. The five new hires are currently in in-field training which should last about three months.