NEW ORLEANS, LA — New Orleans City Council Budget Committee Chair Lesli Harris
championed the passage of the civil service pay plan amendments, creating the Combined DNA Index System (CODIS) Administrator and CODIS Specialist classifications within the New Orleans Police Department, a milestone that puts the city on a path to processing DNA cases in-house and ending its dependence on expensive outsourced analysis.
“Every untested kit represents a delayed opportunity for justice — for survivors, for families, and for our city,” said Councilmember Harris. “We have spent years and millions of dollars outsourcing our DNA work because we didn't have the staff or the facility to do it ourselves. These civil service positions fix that. We are building the infrastructure to solve crimes faster, bring closure to families sooner, and stop paying to fix a problem we can solve permanently.”
The stakes are high. In 2022, over 4,600 DNA cases were pending at the Louisiana State Police Crime Lab. After seeing the untested kits firsthand in Baton Rouge, Councilmember Harris secured $3 million in funding to outsource case processing and begin chipping away at that backlog. Shortly afterward, then Councilmember Helena Moreno and State Representative Mandie Landry secured an additional $1.5 million. But outsourcing is a stopgap, not a solution. Building an in-house DNA unit means New Orleans will no longer need to pay external vendors to handle cases that a fully staffed, city-operated lab can process directly. It also enables the District Attorney to advance prosecutions that otherwise would’ve been too costly, and will result in exonerations for falsely accused individuals.
The Motions approved today establish the job classifications and pay structure needed to recruit and retain qualified DNA analysts and a DNA Technical Leader, the final personnel piece required to activate the NOPD Crime Lab's DNA unit.
With certified positions now in place, NOPD can begin hiring and training analysts immediately, ensuring that when the fourth floor of the crime lab facility completes its retrofit, the DNA unit will be staffed, trained, and ready to open without delay upon national accreditation.
Without today’s Council action, achieving that accreditation would have been impossible until 2028 or later. Now, there is a window to still reach DNA accreditation in 2027, ending the City’s reliance on the State lab.
The NOPD Crime Lab is already fully operational in firearms analysis, fingerprint examination, crime scene investigation, biology, and serology. DNA is the last frontier.
“We are delivering justice through science, technology, and collaboration,” Harris added. “This is how we make sure perpetrators are identified, the innocent are exonerated, and New Orleans never finds itself in a DNA backlog crisis again.”