Narcotics enforcement lab earns high marks for work

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CRAIG T. KOJIMA / ckojima@staradvertiser.com

Kahu Charles Yabui of Kahale Hoano o ke Akua blessed the state Department of Public Safety Narcotics Enforcement Division's drug forensic lab Tuesday. Gov. Neil Abercrombie, left; Mike Grubb, chairman of the Board of Directors of the American Society of Crime Laboratory Directors Laboratory Accreditation Board; and Jodie Maesaka-Hirata, director of the Department of Public Safety, attended the event.

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From a four-car garage and two small storage rooms, two state narcotics investigators created a forensic laboratory recognized as internationally accredited and among the world’s top narcotics enforcement labs.

"There were no marks against the lab," Mike Grubb, American Society of Crime Laboratory Directors/Laboratory Accreditation Board, said Tuesday. "Clearly this lab did a magnificent job. … The work they do is the very best quality."

The state Public Safety Department’s Narcotics Enforcement Division’s crime lab, in the airport area, met 100 percent of the board’s stringent 400-standards checklist. It was accredited Aug. 9 in forensic testing, under the discipline of drug chemistry, for controlled substance analysis, clandestine drug analysis and general chemical analysis.

Before the November 2009 opening of the crime lab, the Honolulu Police Department’s forensics lab primarily provided drug analyses for state cases, with some help from the Department of Health.

"We had no lab to go to except the Honolulu Police Department," said the state Narcotics Enforcement Division’s acting Administrator Derek Nakamura. "HPD had graciously helped the state with forensic drug analysis."

With the new lab, "the state last year did 150 actual bench-related (laboratory) analyses," Nakamura said.

The lab serves Narcotics Enforcement, the Sheriffs Division, state prisons, the Department of the Attorney General, the Kauai Police Department and the Naval Criminal Investigative Service, he said. The Narcotics Enforcement Division investigates fraud-, doctor- and pharmacy-related prescription drug cases, as well as illicit drug cases and prison contraband cases, Nakamura said.

The Narcotics Enforcement Division hired the two investigators, who are former HPD criminalists. Rather than hire consultants, the state used the investigators to tour California labs, then work with engineers to design the setup they wanted and the equipment they needed. Public Safety officials recognized the pair during a blessing ceremony of the lab and announcement of the accreditation. (Because they do undercover work, their identities are being withheld.)