Attorneys often ask me how to access the State Crime Lab’s procedures. I have described how to do it in the post below. I encourage everyone to request access to the procedures and records now because it may take at least one business day for your request to be granted. Once you are given access, you can use your login and password to access the procedures anytime. In other words, don’t wait until you are in trial to try to access these for the first time as it will be too late!
2. If this is your first time accessing the procedures, click on Contact the Crime Laboratory, highlighted below in orange. If you already have a login to the State Crime Lab Sharepoint, then click on the link highlighted below in yellow, and skip to step 5.
3. After clicking on “Contact the Crime Laboratory”, you’ll fill out a form. Provide your contact info and select “Procedure” and write that you would like access to the lab procedures as highlighted below in green.
4. Lab personnel have to manually respond to your request, so it typically takes about one business day to receive a response. It’s not an automated process where you receive a response immediately. In the response you will receive your login and be prompted to create a password. If you don’t receive a response in a few business days, reach out to them again to explain the issue.
5. Once you have a login and password, go to https://ncdoj.gov/crime-lab/iso-procedures/ and click on the yellow link from the image in Step 2 and provide your login and password.
6. When you are logged in, you’ll be able to access current lab procedures (highlighted in blue), previous versions of lab procedures (highlighted in purple), and lab Quality Records (highlighted in pink.
7. It’s likely that the lab can see which items are accessed by a particular user, so if in order to preserve confidentiality you need to download all procedures or records so that the specific items you access is not revealed, you can do that. I’m not aware of records of what is being accessed by a user ever appearing in discovery.
8. If you have questions, please contact me at sarah.r.olson@nccourts.org
