Arkansas State Crime Lab Accredited

The Arkansas State Crime Laboratory at Little Rock and its regional drug lab at Hope have recently attained the prestigious accreditation awarded by the American Society of Crime Laboratory Directors Laboratory Accreditation Board.

In a letter notifying officials of the Arkansas State Crime Laboratory of the accreditations, Donald A. Wyckoff, chairman of the nationally acknowledged leader in crime laboratory standards, states, “Based on documentation provided and in accordance with the recommendation of staff inspector William Smith, the Board is satisfied that each of the laboratories meets or exceeds the standards for accreditation.”

While it is the first instance of the Arkansas State Crime Laboratory being accredited by the national organization, only 307 other crime laboratories across the United States and world meet or exceed the rigorous principles and criteria developed by the ASCLD/LAB.

“The credit for this honor goes to the able and dedicated employees of these laboratories who were committed to the goal of becoming accredited and giving Arkansas citizens the best possible crime labs,” said J.R. Howard, Director of the State Crime Laboratory. “The most direct beneficiaries of the accreditation are law enforcement officers, prosecuting attorneys and defense attorneys across the state who will go to court with their cases knowing the analysis of their evidence has been conducted by some of the most qualified analysts in the country,” Howard said.

The Little Rock lab was accredited in seven disciplines, including controlled substances, trace evidence, toxicology, biology, firearms/tool marks, questioned documents and latent prints. The Hope lab was accredited in the discipline of controlled substances.

As a requirement to retain the accreditations, each lab will continue to participate in external proficiency testing and those test results will be reviewed by ASCLD accredited Proficiency Review Committees. The laboratories will also participate in internal and external audits annually.