Union County Sheriff’s Office opening new crime lab Thursday

UNION COUNTY, N.C. (WBTV) – The Union County Sheriff’s Office provided a look at its new 62,000-square-foot facility that includes a crime lab, which is opening Thursday.

Authorities said using the facility could cut down on crime and speed up the court system.

The new administration building is equipped with a real-time crime center, interview rooms for investigation, a crime lab and a huge evidence storage lab.

Union County Sheriff’s Chief Deputy James Maye says they are most excited about the new crime lab.

The sheriff’s office has six staff members assigned to the lab who will be conducting toxicology testing, fingerprinting and, in the future, DNA testing.

Currently, all forensic blood testing must be sent to the state crime lab in Raleigh, which is backlogged.

It takes several months for Union County to get the results from these tests, which in turn slows down the justice system.

With the new crime lab in Union County, they will get results in a matter of days.

“Our goal is once we get to the point where we feel like we’re serving Union County efficiently that we open our services up to our neighboring counties,” Maye said. “We have great working relationships with Stanly, Cabarrus and all the folks around us and we want to make sure that the people are being served like they should be.”

The building also comes with an evidence storage facility double in size compared to the current one.

This new facility gives them the ability to efficiently process, store and organize tens of thousands of pieces of evidence for indefinite periods of time.

Additionally, the real-time crime center gives the criminal investigations bureau better access to live feeds across the county in critical situations.

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