Premium ContentMouse over Home then click on Premium Content for information.Two people will fill the void left by David Kofoed, the former Douglas County Sheriff's Office crime lab manager who now is in prison.
Last January, the county hired Tracey Ray, formerly of North Carolina, for the $83,000-a-year job. Now it plans to hire a second supervisory manager in January.
Friday was the application deadline for the newly created position of CSI field supervisor. According to the job posting, the maximum starting salary for the new position is $76,000, plus benefits.
Kofoed was paid about $80,000 a year when he left in 2010.
Sheriff Tim Dunning said there are no internal candidates and about a dozen external applicants.
The CSI field supervisor is an important and necessary position, Dunning said. Ray will continue to oversee the crime lab's operations, but she mainly will focus on the chemistry unit, the sheriff said.
Additionally, the crime lab is seeking national accreditation in 2013, and hiring a CSI field supervisor will give Ray more time to dedicate to that process, Dunning said.
The crime lab is located in the former Thomas Fitzgerald Veterans Home near 156th Street and West Maple Road. The building underwent a $4 million renovation, funded with drug forfeiture funds, before the lab moved in last spring.
"Tracey (Ray) is a department head, and this person will be like a sergeant," Dunning said.
Kofoed not only managed the crime lab's chemistry unit, he also went to crime scenes to gather evidence. Hiring a second person will allow a separation of those duties, the sheriff said.
"They will go out to the scenes instead of the way it was with Dave (Kofoed) where he was doing both, and I think he got overwhelmed," Dunning said.
In 2010, Cass County District Judge Randall Rehmeier convicted Kofoed of tampering with evidence. The judge determined Kofoed planted blood evidence in two unrelated Cass County murder cases, the 2003 slaying of Brendan Gonzalez and the 2006 killings of farmers Wayne and Sharmon Stock.
Kofoed, who is serving his sentence at the Omaha Correctional Center, is scheduled to be released May 30.
At last week's County Board meeting, member Mike Boyle said the sheriff shouldn't hire a second crime lab supervisor, because of the county's current budgetary woes.
"We already have a crime lab manager, and now we're going to be spending much more money for another top-level position," Boyle said. "That is not my idea what we ought to be doing. I don't see any benefit to adding this position, and I don't think it's needed."
The county faces a $5 million shortfall in the 2012-13 budget, and several departments have reduced their staffs through attrition. The new CSI field supervisor would bring the crime lab staff to a dozen full-time employees.
Dunning accused Boyle of political grandstanding.
Under state law, the sheriff and other elected officials have discretion on how to use their budgets once they have been approved by the county board. Dunning said the new position was created as a result of not filling another CSI position earlier this year.
"We have the money in our budget," Dunning said. "There is no reason to believe we won't make budget this year."
Board member Marc Kraft said the County Board has little say in how Dunning or other elected officials spend their departments' money.
"We cannot micromanage what he's doing as the sheriff," Kraft said. "We can either accept the fact that he says he needs this position, or we don't. If people in the public are unhappy, they need to let us and let the sheriff know."
But Boyle said the crime lab continues to be a drain on the county's budget. He said he was frustrated that talks haven't occurred about merging the crime labs of the county and the Omaha Police Department.
"The crime lab is a real sore spot," Boyle said. "There is no movement on the merger talks, and it just seems to be something that some people are wanting to go away."
Dunning said he and Omaha Police Chief Alex Hayes still talk regularly but informally about consolidating crime lab services.
It would be unwise to rush into a merger, Dunning said.
"We want to make sure we do things right, since there are two sides affected by this," Dunning said. "There are two sets of employees, three different unions, two different pension systems. Those are some large issues."
Contact the writer: 402-444-1056, john.ferak@owh.com
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