There's a lot of information emerging about how crime labs are not all they are cracked up to be. People look down upon commercial medical labs, but from what I'v seen, they are a lot more careful about procedures and handling that many state crime labs are. (They have to be; most of them do drug testing. The methods and processes of a commercial lab are challengable in court. The methods and processes of a government lab usually aren't.)

The major difference between a commercial lab and a government lab is that one my sue the commercial lab when they screw things up. The government lab has the unjustified protection of "qualified immunity" even if they're a bunch of dope snorting idiots who shouldn't be near a lab. And whose botched results either resulted in an unjust conviction, or a failure to follow up on an actual case.

Sadly, a lot of forensic "science" is the equivalent of reading entrails and tea leaves.

Also, "to protect and serve" for many means myself.

Same thing happened in Austin.
https://www.kvue.com/article/news/local/austin-police-to-reopen-rape-cases-after-dna-results-found-in-backlog-of-900-untested-kits/269-eb572843-2a56-4622-9cc7-7219f9b44411

Research has shown that a bigger deterent than long prison time is high certainty of getting caught. Failure to investigate crimes is itself a crime. A rape kit can come in handy when you nab a guy for another crime.

"...the officer on my case actually seemed annoyed that I was bothering him with, you know, crime."

I suspect a lot of police officers go to work only to collect the paycheck, not to solve crimes. I also suspect a lot of police officers whose job is to solve crimes don't have a clue about how to do that. It probably annoys them when someone asks them to do their job.

There are people like that working in medical labs and crime labs too. When we get the results of a blood test we like to believe that the numbers on the printout accurately represent the conditions in our blood. Maybe they do, maybe they don't. The lab results we see are just numbers someone entered on a form. Their accuracy depends on a lot of things: the conditions of the lab and equipment for example; but even more on the knowledge, skill, character, integrity and work ethic of the person who's job is to do the test. Some lab technicians lack one or more of those qualities.

I've worked with nurses who don't know diddly-shit about the illnesses their patients are being treated for; no idea about the purpose of the medications they give, the safe dose ranges, the desired effect or possible side effects - and they have no desire to learn. They carry their cell phones around, in areas where they're forbidden by law, and spend all the effing day texting, whom I do not know, chatting, shopping Amazon. They treat patients who need their attention like they're obnoxious.

I've worked around doctors who spend 10-15 minutes assessing a patient - nowhere near enough - document that they spent 60-90 minutes (for billing) and prescribe drugs that can have profound effects, good and bad. If the patient tries to report symptoms or complains of side effects, or the treatment doesn't work, the doctor gets offended and blames, sometimes even retaliates against, the patient.

We need to make it legal for victims themselves (or families in cases where the victim dies) to prosecute the perp themselves, and require the perp to repay them once convicted.

This is not a perfect answer, but it does provide accountability to victims in places where the police don't like them for political reasons or just don't feel like doing their jobs.

In particular it should be good against police who use unnecessary force or destroy or take property from an innocent person.

“We need to make it legal for victims themselves (or families in cases where the victim dies) to prosecute the perp themselves, and require the perp to repay them once convicted.”

When the criminal has any assets worth going after , that often happens. For example Nicole Simpson’s family pursued OJ in civil court and won.

However, most criminals are not the sorts who have assets and the old rule, “you can’t get blood out of a turnip” applies.

There are police officers that like to do their job. You just have to get past the bureaucracy to the cop who actually does the work.

I lived next door to a church with a pre-school in the most crime-free area in Los Angeles. A drug dealer decide that the sidewalk in front of the church was a good place to do business. I talked to the local L.A.P.D. senior lead officer and gave him the license plate number and description of the drug dealers car. He said he'd pass it on to the proper detective. The drug dealer kept dealing. I called the SLO and asked when they were going to bust the guy, and the SLO said the info I gave him wasn't good enough, that they needed some photos. I sent him security camera videos of the guy conducting business where you could see him and read his license plate. Again, time went by with nothing done.

I complained to the SLO again, and he said the videos weren't good enough. OK, I'm sick of this shit. I used to shoot Formula 1 with Road & Track, so I pulled out my gear. I knew the drug dealer's MO by now, so on New Years Day morning I mounted a Nikon DSLR in a tree with a mild telephoto lens and a radio remote to fire it off. I sat in the house and watched my surveillance camera setup and sure enough a buyer stopped in front of the church so I knew the dealer would show up in about 10 minutes. I triggered the camera from inside the house when the dealer's car went past a tree in front of my house. 40 shots in eight seconds.

I waited until the dealer and the buyer left, then recovered my camera out of the tree. I processed the high-res JPGs and emailed them to the senior lead officer once again, with a comment that not only can you read the license plate but also the registration sticker numbers on the plate too, so maybe this would be good enough for the SLO.

I was pissed off after two more weeks of hearing nothing, but on January 14 I got a call from a narcotics detective saying this, "Sorry I haven't been around my desk to give you a call about that truck you complained about. I ended up knowing that guy and I had arrested him before, and I ended up arresting him again last night. My partner and I knew of him and knew where he lived, so we followed him and caught him in the act again. Thanks for giving us a heads-up." I talked to the detective the next day and found that none of the info I had given the SLO, the written license plate and car description, nor any of the videos had filtered down to him. Just my hi-res photos as I had told the SLO I was going to complain to the watch-commander if nothing was done.

Next time I have a situation like this, I'm going straight to the detectives and bypass the bureaucracy. There are plenty of cops who would do the job if they knew about the problem.

It has always been a hoax that you can turn all your defensive needs over to the police.

Always.