Photographing Evidence....

[Squish]

So saturday night i get called to help out with a possible OWI stop. The officer who made contact had to take the suspect to the hospital to get a blood draw. When the results came back (she was on a real buffet of drugs) he called me to go ahead and start my inventory and call for the next avaliable wrecker. as soon as I started my search I found two baggies of a "green leafy substance" and 5 "partialy burnt hand rolled cigaretts". so i begin taking notes of where I'm finding this stuff, and filling out the vehicle inventory sheet.

Here's where the photographing thing comes in....

I know all of our paid guys have a dept issued camera in their car, and use them quite frequently. How many of you have had your batteries die or have forgotten your camera at your desk only to need it. what did you do? take pics with your "smart" phone and either email them to yourself, or down load them when you get back to do the report? call another partol and use theirs?

It didn't dawn on me to use my phone to take the pics, so there I was taking copious notes of where all of this stuff was, since I knew would be filling out a supplemental report, packaging, and cataloging the evidence later.

[just joe]

The camera case should have spare batteries. We never photograph misdemeanor amounts of drugs found in a vehicle during an inventory.

[irish21]

Yeah don't use your phone.
Thinks like that can be called into evidence by the court.

Happened to my buddy when he bought a new Droid X, he thought he was being cool using it to take pictures and voice recordings. Court wanted it, court got it.

[OneAdam12]

Drug stores have disposable cameras too. Expense report it. Some are cheaper than batteries.
Just a suggestion.

[Dingo990]

I never photograph minor amounts of dope when I find it in a car, has never been a problem.

Also, I just call it marijuana in my reports. After a few years of typing out "green leafy substance", I got annoyed and decided I'm going to call a spade a spade. So initially in my report, I will say "A substance a believed to be marijuana" and for the rest of the report (and evidence sheets), marijuana. That has never been a problem either.

[HI629]

+1 on not using your personal cell phone for work. I've heard horror stories from buddies who had their personal cell phones taken for evidence in court. In a couple of cases, the cell phone records were taken to ensure that he didn't text or email photographs inappropriately.

I have extra batteries, SD cards, etc. in my equipment bag. I also carry a pre-paid cell phone that has a camera for emergency purposes.

[Prov1x]

Blood draw and results in one night?? Geez, takes us months and months to get results back.

[Dingo990]

Blood draw and results in one night?? Geez, takes us months and months to get results back.

Our local hospitals are pretty good about getting results back. They can typically do urine in a shift, blood tests a bit longer maybe 5-10 days.

[dontknowwhy]

We aren't even allowed to have our tested here. We have to send it to a crime lab. To the OP, we don't search cars without a backup unit, so there is always a 2nd camera, plus we have our dash cams on and will speak the location and item description in to the mic box.

[913]

Blood draw and results in one night?? Geez, takes us months and months to get results back.

No doubt. It usually takes days, if not weeks, for results to come back for us.

[sp23]

So saturday night i get called to help out with a possible OWI stop. The officer who made contact had to take the suspect to the hospital to get a blood draw. When the results came back (she was on a real buffet of drugs) he called me to go ahead and start my inventory and call for the next avaliable wrecker. as soon as I started my search I found two baggies of a "green leafy substance" and 5 "partialy burnt hand rolled cigaretts". so i begin taking notes of where I'm finding this stuff, and filling out the vehicle inventory sheet.

Here's where the photographing thing comes in....

I know all of our paid guys have a dept issued camera in their car, and use them quite frequently. How many of you have had your batteries die or have forgotten your camera at your desk only to need it. what did you do? take pics with your "smart" phone and either email them to yourself, or down load them when you get back to do the report? call another partol and use theirs?

It didn't dawn on me to use my phone to take the pics, so there I was taking copious notes of where all of this stuff was, since I knew would be filling out a supplemental report, packaging, and cataloging the evidence later.

Don't know how you were trained, but we were taught to never call it "green" in any report. That "green leafy substance" that you found yesterday will be a dark shade of brown when it goes to court in a year or two.

We just simply call it "plant material".

[Squish]

there is an awful lot of expireace here, and i love the feed back. thanks i really appreciate it. i'm always open to learning something.....even the smallest things. one of the reasons i asked some of the questions in the OP is since i'm a reserve the Dept doesn't equip us like they do the paid guys. which is understandable, but some times it can make things a little difficult. i see a cheap digital camera in my future, with extra SD cards. as well as a pre-paid cell phone for making calls to contacts while on duty. yes *67 works, but a lot of people won't answer a blocked or private number......

[Prov1x]

there is an awful lot of expireace here, and i love the feed back. thanks i really appreciate it. i'm always open to learning something.....even the smallest things. one of the reasons i asked some of the questions in the OP is since i'm a reserve the Dept doesn't equip us like they do the paid guys. which is understandable, but some times it can make things a little difficult. i see a cheap digital camera in my future, with extra SD cards. as well as a pre-paid cell phone for making calls to contacts while on duty. yes *67 works, but a lot of people won't answer a blocked or private number......

For making phone calls....Google Voice is the answer! You just login or setup an account if you don't have one. It gives you a ton of numbers to choose from. If you have a smart phone you can download the app and it makes it a lot easier. But if you don't have a smart phone you can just login to your account on the internet, put the number in and click "call". It will first call your phone and then connect you to the number you are trying to reach. You can also send a receive text messages with the service. I use it numerous times on a daily basis and it's a great service.

[deputybubba]

Also for making phone calls we call dispatch and have them transfer our calls. One time of having someone call me on my cell phone to ask how the case was going was enough, I do this every time now.

[eagleI]

Maybe you are too rural but couldn't you have called someone to bring batteries or a fresh camera?
Never use your phone. Case law says they can subpoena all your contacts & phone records.
If you really want to, buy an inexpensive digital camera.