Evidence management

Evidence management is the administration and control of evidence related to an event so that it can be used to prove the circumstances of the event, and so that this proof can be tested by independent parties with confidence that the evidence provided is the evidence collected related to the event.

Evidence management requires that the evidence is:

that is, the evidence presented for the proof is the exact evidence collected.

Evidence management requiries the techniques used in:

Evidence must be managed and administered over its entire lifetime. The lifetime of a piece of evidence includes a number of key stages, from the piece of evidence's acquisition to its eventual disposal:

At all stages of its life, the piece of evidence must typically be moved in and out of storage, and be handled by different people. This places very strong requirements on the integrity of the chain of custody, and in particular on the personnel involved and the duty of care of the organisation responsible. For example, Interpol has published standards to combat corruption, and Standard 4.12 refers to systems and states:

Evidence and property management is typically considered critical to the extent that the efficiency or economy of the processes are secondary to the integrity of the evidence and property.

The digitising of evidence is reducing the need to handle the original evidence until it is presented. The reduction in the handling of the original evidence lessens the likelihood of deliberate tampering or accidental contamination and reduces chain of custody requirements and overheads.

While the chain of custody stops with presentation, accountability and responsibility remains until the evidence is disposed of.

Evidence management is critical to the outcome of criminal prosecutions. If any of the above aspects of evidence management fail in relation to the evidence required for a prosecution, then it can compromise the outcome of the prosecution.

The proper management of evidence is so important to organisations responsible for evidence that they develop formal standards for the management, administration, and handling of evidence. The failure to apply proper standards to property processing can result in severe criticism of an organisation. These standards and procedures can vary from consensual indicative standards internationally adopted as a benchmark reference by organisations across the world, be specific to the initial evidence handling procedures for specific institutions, be the lifetime standards for evidence handling for an organisation, or be formal national standards.

The primary aspect of the management of physical evidence is the provision of suitable storage facility. Storage facilities for evidence can vary in size from a single secure cabinet in an office to large dedicated warehouses. The physical storage of evidence in modern departments is often accomplished using hi-density shelving systems. These systems allow use of only one aisle to access several rows of shelving by means of rolling carriages that have shelving mounted to them. This results in storing double the amount of evidence in the same space that would be used on static shelving. These hi-density system can accommodate shelving, shelving with lockable drawers, bulk rack, pallet rack, and lockable cabinets. In addition hi-density style systems can lock off specific aisles for the various degrees of security often needed for items such as guns and drugs.

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