The Legislative Audit Bureau makes 16 recommendations to the Department of Justice.

Funding and Staffing Issues (p. 11)

We recommend the Department of Justice:  

1. fill the 3.0 full-time equivalent positions authorized by 2023 Wisconsin Act 19, the 2023-2025 Biennial Budget Act, with forensic toxicologists, as required by the Joint Committee on Finance motion; (p. 14)
2. retain all existing forensic toxicology positions after it fills the 3.0 full-time equivalent positions with forensic toxicologists; (p. 14)

Timeliness in Analyzing Evidence (p. 19)

We recommend the Department of Justice:

3. monitor the timeliness in processing sexual assault kits; (p. 31)
4. ensure sexual assault kits are processed within the deadlines required by 2023 Wisconsin Act 58; (p. 31)
5. take appropriate action, such as providing additional training and guidance to crime laboratory staff or modifying how it uses the services of private laboratories, if the statutorily required deadlines are not met; (p. 32)

Improving Timeliness (p. 37)

We recommend the Department of Justice:  

6. formally establish comprehensive written policies pertaining to the productivity standards for senior and advanced analysts; (p. 38)
7. track the extent to which analysts in a given unit met the policy-defined productivity standards during a given period of time; (p. 38)
8. periodically review the policy-defined productivity standards and determine whether they need to be modified; (p. 38)
9. use the information from the policy-defined productivity standards to assess the operations of the crime laboratories; (p. 39)
10. develop written policies that define how crime laboratories record in the laboratory information management system the priority level of assignments, as well as key information associated with assignment prioritization; (p. 40)
11. provide training and guidance to crime laboratory staff on these written policies; (p. 40)
12. monitor whether crime laboratory staff consistently comply with these written policies; (p. 40)
13. monitor whether crime laboratory staff complete assignments within the times it has specified in writing; (p. 40)
14. adopt a standardized measure of turnaround time when comparing the timeliness of its state crime laboratories to the timeliness of laboratories participating in Project FORESIGHT; (p. 42)
15. ensure its annual reports on the state crime laboratories indicate the total amount of time it took to process sexual assault kits, including the amount of time a private laboratory took to test evidence associated with the kits; and (p. 42)

Audit Follow-Up Reporting

16. We recommend the Department of Justice report to the Joint Legislative Audit Committee by September 30, 2024, on its efforts to implement all of these recommendations.