Exhibits and seized property management software addresses a range of risks, ensuring the security, continuity, and integrity of items, while mitigating the consequences of ineffective management. It provides a comprehensive tracking and information management solution that records every touch point on forensic evidence and investigative intelligence, for best-practice electronic information management.
Police collect a vast range of property in the course of their duties, encompassing all lost and found, created, surrendered and seized property that comes into their possession. An exhibit is any property in police possession that may be tendered in court as evidence. Victoria Police records show approximately 470 000 items in police possession, stored at more than 200 locations. Police Management of Property and Exhibits
Establishing a solid chain of custody for your exhibits and seized property is essential to ensuring justice is served. In criminal, civil, or administrative cases, the integrity of the legal process depends on the proper handling and presentation of evidence.
What Is Exhibits Management Software?
Evidence management software transforms the way law enforcement agencies handle digital and physical evidence, eliminating the need for paper based processes. These systems offer a faster, more efficient solution for submitting, managing, presenting, and disposing of evidence, reshaping the entire process.
The automation of exhibit and seized property dramatically reduces the amount of time officers spend on maintaining manual evidence logs or briefs. Each piece of new information is only ever entered once into a database. Joining a full audit trail/chain of custody capturing every entry and interaction with that exhibit item.
What Is Evidence Chain of Custody?
Without a reliable record of who handled the evidence and when, its authenticity and admissibility in court can be challenged. Evidence management software solves this problem by digitally tracking each item’s journey from the moment it’s collected. Every officer, technician, and handler is logged with time stamps, ensuring accountability at every step. Ensuring every piece of evidence can be traced back to its origin without any possibility of alteration or tampering. This systematic approach is designed to create an ironclad guarantee of the evidence’s integrity, ensuring that it remains pure as it moves through various stages.
Ensure the Integrity of Exhibits
The Judicial system relies upon credible evidence that can withstand scrutiny when contested. This certainty and the integrity of such evidence are provided through the efficient management and tracking of exhibit chain of custody. The goal is to streamline and automate the management of evidence, improve tracking and retrieval, and enhance security and accountability. To ensure the integrity of evidence, various processes and tools are used and these include:
Chain of Custody
Ensures that the items seized by officers are properly registered and recorded in an evidence management system. Accurate documentation helps establish a correct chain of custody, which is essential for the evidence to be accepted in a court of law.
Exhibits Movement
Keeping a record of when items are removed from and returned to the storage facility ensures that the evidence remains secure, and its integrity is preserved.
Safety and Security
The safety and security of seized articles are of utmost importance in maintaining the integrity of evidence. Comprehensive evidence management software will ensure that access limits, regular monitoring, and audits, are in place to safeguard the confiscated items. Minimising the risk of tampering, theft, or damage to the evidence, thereby preserving its integrity. Additionally, explosives, bio-hazard items and other high-risk evidence are clearly identified in the system to protect those that are handling the exhibits.
Benefits of Evidence Management Software
Improve the management of tampering risk and loss of evidence and meet compliance requirements through comprehensive chain of custody processes and reporting.
Security: Mandate the scope of data visible to a user. Administrators define domains which grant permissions to access specific data relevant to their tasks. This helps maintain the accuracy and validity of data; while arming people with the information they need to get the job done to deliver value.
Search and Audit Capabilities: Powerful search capabilities that allow the user to slice and dice the data and quickly find the evidence item they are looking for. Audit of the evidence stored can be performed by means of smartphones and tablets, reducing the time taken from days to mere hours and minutes.
Reporting: Supply reports on demand or automatically upon the occurrence of given events or a consolidated view of all items.
Effectively Manage: Investigative and forensic process with a complete audit trail of all physical and digital property and exhibits from the point of capture, right through to court and final disposal.
Live Tracking Of Movements: Transfers and data access means complete visibility at every stage of exhibit processing and that the chain of custody is fully transparent. The risk of evidence tampering is minimised through enforced accountability at every stage.
Track Every Interaction: System records changes as the chain of custody log, ensuring accountability and the current location of the item being accurately reflected. This is key to ensuring items can be easily found when required.
Automated Work-Flows: Routing of jobs improve the complete life cycle management of cases, events, incidents and exhibits and reduce forensics backlogs.
Manage: Health and safety risk through warnings and indicators for people handling evidence.
Easy identification: Flags evidence ready for disposal and simplifies disposal processes.
Mobility: Working in the field, without being tethered to a desktop PC using iOS and Android devices. Deployment on specialist, ruggedised devices with built-in hardware for barcode and RFID tag scanning, GPS tagging, and photographic image collection.
Broad Multimedia Capability: Allowing users to capture all manner of video, images, audio, and documents related to exhibits.
Hardcat evidence management software is transforming the way law enforcement agencies, legal teams, and government bodies handle exhibits. With enhanced accountability, greater efficiency, and improved security, this technology ensures that justice is served with accuracy and reliability. For those working in sectors reliant on evidence, adopting our software could be the key to maintaining the trust and integrity of their investigations.
