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Broward Office of the Inspector General Attn John W Scott shy One N University Drive Suite111 Plantation FL 33324

Dear Inspector General Scott

On February 28 2017 the Broward Office of the Inspector General issued a final report in its investigation of the Hollywood Police Department Property and Evidence Unit (PEU) In a previous letter dated February 9 2017 we provided you a report of all the corrective actions taken by the Hollywood Police Department (HPD) between January 2012 and February 2017 Your final report noted a number of the improvements made by HPD to its facility policies and procedures HPD was tasked with providing a 90-day status report regarding any additional progress or improvements

The following is a summarized list of additional actions or steps taken by HPD to further improve or enhance the Departments Property and Evidence Unit in the 90 days since the OIGs final report was issued

bull The Property and Evidence Unit continues to destroy andor dispose of all property entered into the PropertyEvidence Unit as allowed by Florida State Statutes and Department Policy

o A total of 1224 items were purged from the PEU o An additional 3440 items have been researched approved and are pending

destruction o The Departments Drug Terminator device was utilized to conduct two drug burns with

an additional burn being scheduled within the next few weeks pending judicial approval o The Department transported an additional 100 firearms to the Broward Sheriffs Office

(BSO) for destruction bringing the total number of firearms destroyed since the start of the OIG investigation to 502 firearms

o The Department has an additional 100 firearms pending destruction but is constrained by BSOs current limit of 50 firearms per month

bull The Department has requested two additional part-time property clerk positions be added to the Fiscal Year 2018 budget to enhance the PEUs efficiency The part-time property clerk positions are in addition to the four full-time positions already added to the PEU meaning the Department will have invested approximately $27224200 in additional recurring annual base salary personnel costs not including benefits since the beginning of the OIG investigation

bull We are finalizing the Property Clerk Work Manual establishing clearly delineated employee guidelines in addition to existing policies and procedures

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Broward Office of the Inspector General May 22 2017 Page 2

bull The Department has obtained a quote for approximately $770000 to purchase a climateshycontrolled storage container to relieve overcrowding in Vault 2

bull The Department is purchasing a currency counter with serial number scanning and counterfeit detection technology to accurately record and document currency at a cost of $9 10000

bull The Department has obtained quotes identified funding and is awaiting approval for upgrades of approximately $5000000 to the Departments video surveillance capabilities which include

o Improved HD cameras providing higher quality video o New web based remote access and viewing capabilities o Increased storage and retention of archival data

bull The Department has begun meeting with vendors to research new Property Management Systems with RFID technology that allows for scanning to accurately track inventory and audit property and evidence The Department is identifying law enforcement agencies utilizing similar technology in order to conduct site visits to benchmark this technology

bull In a continued effort to provide training and certification opportunities the Department approved advanced training requests for the PEU supervisor and a property clerk to attend the Property and Evidence Association of Florida State Conference

In conclusion the Hollywood Police Department has made a considerable financial and human resource investment while continuing to review our processes and implement additional improvements in our ongoing efforts to maintain the best practices in our Property and Evidence Unit Please contact me if you have any questions or need any additional information

Sincerely

~~ TOMASSANC~ Chief of Police

c Wazir A Ishmael PhD City Manager Melvin Standley Assistant City Manager for Public Safety Gus Zambrano Assistant City Manager for Sustainable Development George Keller Assistant City Manager for Finance and Administration Mayor Vice-Mayor amp City Commissioners

CITY of HOLLYWOOD FLORIDA

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February 9 2017

Broward Office of the Inspector General Attn John W Scott One N University Drive Suite111 Plantation FL 33324

Dear Inspector General Scott

A cover letter dated March 28 2016 included a report of all the corrective action by the Hollywood Police Department (HPD) between January 2012 and March 2016 that were taken to address the issues identified in the OIGs Investigation of the Departments Property and Evidence Unit

Noted below in this letter is a summarized list of additional actions or steps taken since March of 2016 to make additional improvements or enhancements of the Departmenfs Property and Evidence Unit

bull A Drug Terminator device was purchased and used to conduct eight (8) drug burns destroying over 140 pounds of drugs

bull We have eliminated the submission of affidavits and consent forms to the Property Unit which reduces the amount of documents taken in and instead those documents will be placed in the case file A General Order was issued so those documents are now submitted directly to our Records Unit Over 1300 older forms previously held by the Property Unit have been transferred to the Records Unit

bull Queries have been created in our Records Management Systems to identify old suicide and naturalaccidental death investigation cases Those items are being reviewed by the Homicide Unit to find out if they can be purged All OSSI cases of this nature have already been sent for review

bull In 2016 we purged 16 122 items and received 16062 which means we reached a milestone by purging more items than we received

bull We have donated hundreds of bikes to a local charity called FLIPANYRBX They have a program within the Broward County School System for at risk youths who learn how to rebuild the bikes and then re-distribute them back into the community

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Broward Office of the Inspector General February 9 2017 Page 2

bull We have conducted remedial training with our Officers to lessen mistakes related to submitting evidence to the Unit

bull We are now utilizing FDLEs Firearm Eligibility System (FES) prior to returning any firearms This system checks national criminal mental health and military databases to verify there are no disqualifications for possessing a firearm

bull We have located over 80 of the missing items from the RGIS inventory list (reducing that list from 10918 to 2310 items) We are now doing a secondary check for items The secondary check is in progress to further reduce the number of items on that list and is about 50 complete

bull We have improved the abi lity to identify evidence items more efficiently based on case type (felony or misdemeanor) in our Records Management System (OSSI) This will allow us to more quickly identify misdemeanor items which may be purged instead of storing them indefinitely

bull We have updated our Master Plan for fixing property The Master Plan was previously submitted to the OIG Phase One has been completed Phase Two is in still in progress and is about 60 completed Phase Three began and is about 40 completed The bicycle project from Phase Three is completed Part of Phase Four has just been started and is about 5 completed

bull Three (3) of our five (5) Property Clerks have become certified via attendance at the Property and Evidence Association of Florida State Conference We plan to send two (2) more Property Clerks and the Property Supervisor this coming year so that all of our Property Clerks will possess the Property and Evidence Specialist certification

As you can see we have continued to review our processes and implement additional improvements in our ongoing efforts to maintain the best practices in our Property and Evidence Unit Please contact me if you have any questions or need any additional information

Sincerely

TOMAS SANCHEZ Chief of Police

Broward Office of the Inspector General February 9 2017 Page 2

bull We have conducted remedial training with our Officers to lessen mistakes related to submitting evidence to the Unit

bull We are now utilizing FDLEs Firearm Eligibility System (FES) prior to returning any firearms This system checks national criminal mental health and military databases to verify there are no disqualifications for possessing a firearm

bull We have located over 80 of the missing items from the RGIS inventory list (reducing that list from 10918 to 2310 items) We are now doing a secondary check for items The secondary check is in progress to further reduce the number of items on that list and is about 50 complete

bull We have improved the abi lity to identify evidence items more efficiently based on case type (felony or misdemeanor) in our Records Management System (OSSI) This will allow us to more quickly identify misdemeanor items which may be purged instead of storing them indefinitely

bull We have updated our Master Plan for fixing property The Master Plan was previously submitted to the OIG Phase One has been completed Phase Two is in still in progress and is about 60 completed Phase Three began and is about 40 completed The bicycle project from Phase Three is completed Part of Phase Four has just been started and is about 5 completed

bull Three (3) of our five (5) Property Clerks have become certified via attendance at the Property and Evidence Association of Florida State Conference We plan to send two (2) more Property Clerks and the Property Supervisor this coming year so that all of our Property Clerks will possess the Property and Evidence Specialist certification

As you can see we have continued to review our processes and implement additional improvements in our ongoing efforts to maintain the best practices in our Property and Evidence Unit Please contact me if you have any questions or need any additional information

Sincerely

TOMAS SANCHEZ Chief of Police