The Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, Scientific Services Bureau is committed to improving its analysis time for evidentiary samples submitted for alcohol testing to meet court deadlines as well as analysis timeframes imposed on the laboratory by the California Department of Motor Vehicles.

The LASD has accepted grant Agreement Number AL24014 in the amount of $26,400 offered by the State of California Office of Traffic Safety for the Fiscal Year 2023-2034 Improved Alcohol Impaired Driving Toxicology Testing Program. The Agreement term is from Oct. 1, 2023, through Sept. 30, 2024.

The laboratory’s goal is to complete the analysis of DUI evidentiary samples in felony cases within 15 business days of sample submission to the laboratory and complete misdemeanor cases within 45 days. The grant will fund the purchase of four automated diluters which will increase sample preparation efficiency and allow for a more thorough output of samples for analysis by headspace gas chromatography.

The purpose of the OTS Improved Alcohol Impaired Driving Toxicology Testing Program is to provide funding that will be used by local law enforcement to reduce the number of persons killed in alcohol-related traffic collisions. The grant funds will be used to purchase BAC testing equipment for the Department’s Crime Laboratory. The additional diluters will effectively double the Crime Laboratory’s current processing capacity, thereby reducing the existing case backlog and foreshortening future turnaround times, which in turn will deliver prompt results to the prosecuting attorneys.

More than 200 Federal, State, and Municipal law enforcement agencies operating within the county submit an average of 5,675 blood and urine samples annually to the Department’s Crime Laboratory for analysis of Blood Alcohol Content.

The Crime Laboratory report provides the BAC of evidence submissions. The reports are made available to the submitting agency and the agency’s prosecuting attorney for consideration of filing a case. Timely analysis is necessary to exonerate suspects or prosecute felony and misdemeanor violations of California’s Driving Under the Influence statutes. Failure to perform timely analysis of evidence submissions may result in the degradation of evidence submissions and/or the expiration of statutory time limits for prosecuting violations.

At the time of application submission, the laboratory had a seven-month backlog. Cases were not being tried in a timely manner at various Los Angeles County courts and DMV offices throughout California due to the lack of analytical results.