BATON ROUGE, LA - Acting United States Attorney Walt Green announced today that the Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, has recently awarded one grant to Louisiana State Police and two grants to Louisiana Commission on Law Enforcement.
Louisiana State Police was awarded $1,551,210 in funding for their DNA Backlog Reduction Program. This program focuses on reducing DNA sample turnaround time, increasing the throughput of public DNA laboratories, and reducing DNA backlogs. These improvements are critical in preventing future DNA backlogs and to help the criminal justice system use the full potential DNA technology.
Louisiana Commission on Law Enforcement received two grants totaling $361,931. Their Juvenile Accountability Block Program was awarded $266,152 and Paul Coverdell Forensic Science Improvement Program was awarded $95,779.
The goal of the Juvenile Accountability Block program is to reduce juvenile offending through accountability-based programs focused on both the juvenile offender and the juvenile justice system. The underlying premise is that young people who violate the law should be held accountable for their actions through the swift, consistent application of graduated sanctions that are proportionate to the offenses, both as a matter of basic justice and as a way to combat juvenile delinquency and improve the quality of life in the nation’s communities.
The Coverdell funds are to be used to improve the quality and timeliness of forensic science and medical examiner services and/or to eliminate backlogs in the analysis of forensic evidence, including controlled substances, firearms examinations, forensic pathology, latent prints, questioned documents, toxicology, and trace evidence.
For more information about these grants, please contact the Office of Justice Program’s Office of Communications at 202-307-0703.
Source: U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the United States Attorneys
