California Department of Fish and Game - Wildlife Forensics Laboratory

Wildlife Forensics Laboratory

To protect wildlife from abuse by poaching, California Fish and Game Wardens must be able to determine as much as possible about the sex, species, age, and origin of bloodstains, tissues and other animal parts they confiscate or find. For example, in the course of an investigation, tissue samples may be collected at the site of an illegal kill, bloodstains may be found in a vehicle, and frozen meat seized at a residence. Other examples are as widespread as is the variation in fauna throughout the State of California, from the crest of the Sierras, the Desert and to the Pacific Ocean. Such samples can provide not only investigative information, but, can also later be used as evidence in criminal trials. A critical link in the impact of this physical evidence is the amount of information that can be obtained through analyses at a Forensic Crime Lab.

The term "forensic" is most simply defined as the application of science to the purposes of the law. "Crime Labs" are laboratories which, as their primary function, conduct forensic analyses on physical evidence primarily in criminal cases and provide legally acceptable reports and expert testimony regarding their findings. For wildlife purposes, the California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW) has maintained a Wildlife Forensic Laboratory (WFL) since the early 1950s. The WFL's sole purpose and mission is to use accepted forensic science procedures to examine, analyze, report and testify at criminal trials on physical evidence seized by CDFG Wardens in criminal poaching cases. As such, the WFL is a State Crime Lab. It is the only State Wildlife Forensic Lab. This mission is mandated by the California Judicial System in order to enforce and prosecute criminal cases. During the past fifty plus years thousands of poachers have been convicted of crimes perpetrated on wildlife partially because of results provided by the WFL on evidence submitted by Fish and Game Wardens. In addition the deterrent effect on poaching just by the mere existence of the WFL is immeasurable.

The impact made by forensic analyses of physical evidence in criminal investigations and in criminal trials can hardly be overstated. As former California Attorney General and now Congressman Dan Lungren stated in a news release on January 17, 1996 in which he proposed funding for State Human Crime Lab upgrades, "I have been trying to find some silver lining to the O. J. Simpson case, it may be that millions of people now understand the importance of criminal forensics. That has not always been the case". In addition the television series CSI has added to the public awareness, even though it may not always be realistic. The statement by Lungren alludes to a fundamental ignorance by many non-law enforcement government entities and individuals of the necessity for high quality criminal forensics in California Criminal Justice. This problem manifested itself at the CDFG when, up until 1992, the WFL was under the Wildlife Management Division rather than the Wildlife Protection Division, whose needs they served. During that time, the WFL was extremely under budgeted, given very low priority for supplies, manpower, and equipment, discouraged from scientific modernization, and was consistently the first section scheduled for elimination during the Departments constant cyclic budgetary problems. Virtually all public crime labs in California are assigned directly under a law enforcement agency to minimize this type of problem. They are either under their City or County Sheriff or Police Department, the County District Attorney's Office, or in the case of the California state government human crime labs, the California Department of Justice. Accordingly, the WFL appropriately became assigned under the Wildlife Protection Division in 1993 where the unique needs of criminal forensics could be monitored and directed by the CDFG's law enforcement entity which exclusively uses these highly specialized and judicially intensely scrutinized services.