Columbus GBI crime lab slated to shut down by end of March

The Georgia Bureau of Investigation crime lab in Columbus is on life support, and the state is scheduled to pull the plug at the end of March.

Because of increasing state budget pressures, the GBI will eliminate three of its seven crime labs that process evidence ranging from drug samples to DNA.

That move has law enforcement officials in the Columbus area fighting to save the local lab that employs seven people and tests evidence from 19 surrounding counties. Losing it would impact investigations and cost law enforcement agencies additional money to transport or ship evidence from the Chattahoochee Valley to Macon or metro Atlanta, critics of the state cost-cutting measure said.

“We need more scientists than buildings because buildings don’t solve cases,” said Dr. George Herrin, who is in charge of the state crime labs.

Randy Robertson, a major in the Muscogee County Sheriff’s Office and president of the local Fraternal Order of Police chapter, said the FOP is “adamantly opposed” to the closing.

“What it appears is they are looking at it strictly from a political standpoint and not from an efficiency standpoint,” Robertson said. “They are absolutely right, buildings don’t solve cases. And bureaucrats don’t solve criminal cases, either. ... It’s not bricks and mortar, it’s politics.”

Not so, said Herrin.

The state employs 274 people in eight crime labs. To save money, as the GBI is looking at an 8 percent budget cut, labs in Columbus, Moultire and Summerville in the northwest corner of the state will be closed in less than two months. That will leave the headquarters lab in Decatur and regional labs in Cleveland, Augusta, Savannah and Macon.

Columbus will be the largest city in the state without ready access to GBI test facilities. Those counties that the Columbus lab serves will be divided between the Decatur and Macon offices, Herrin said. Those assignments are still under consideration.

‘Lab is valuable’ to area

Closing the Columbus office is a problem, if you talk to local law enforcement officials.

Columbus Police Chief Ricky Boren said he doesn’t agree with the state police chiefs, whose association is supporting the proposed closures.

“The ballistics testing has helped us on many occasions early in an investigation,” he said. “For example, if the lab is open we can take a projectile or casing and get an immediate reading on what type of weapon we are dealing with.”

That quick information can be invaluable to detectives, Boren said.

“If you have a suspect in custody, you can use that information,” he said. “It is helpful to know.”

If the lab is closed, that information could — and will — be delayed, Boren said.

“If we have to drive it to Macon or Atlanta, it may be the next day before we can get it there,” he said. “Then it may be the next few days before we have the results. That is just one example how the lab is valuable to us in this region.”