Katie Moore with additional reporting by Mike Perlstein / Eyewitness News
NEW ORLEANS -- New Orleans police have launched a criminal investigation into more missing money from the department's Central Evidence and Property Division.
Despite new people and procedures running evidence and property, put in place by Chief Ronal Serpas, the department is once again trying to determine where the money went or who took it.
Inside a non-descript warehouse in Central City, the New Orleans Police Department stores all evidence and property seized during criminal investigations.
It's the second post-Katrina home for evidence and property, and now for the third time, money is missing from the warehouse.
“This auditing procedure has now triggered what we want to do is a full criminal investigation to make sure we know exactly what happened,” said Serpas.
According to a police report filed Jan. 28, Rose Duryea, the Central Evidence and Property commander, and police officer Earl Johnson discovered $606 missing from a secure drop box that officers put seized valuables in.
The commander says there was a concern that drug evidence had accidentally been placed into that drop box. They found the drugs inside, but they didn't find the money, even though the $606 was logged in on Jan. 16.
“Any employee who's involved in theft is obviously gonna be charged and we're gonna go for every possibility in the criminal court that we possibly can,” Serpas said.
The incident is being investigated as a theft, but Serpas says there is a possibility the money was misplaced.
“I was appointed in May and the first decisions we made was to replace all the leadership in the property room because we wanted to make sure we get that right,” Serpas said.
His original appointee has since retired, and Duryea appointed a new sensitive evidence officer in early January.
Both are needed to open the drop boxes.
“There's supposed to be two keys to this lock box and there's no one else who's supposed to have one,” said Rafael Goyeneche, president of the Metropolitan Crime Commission. “Well, if the lock wasn't tampered with, somebody has a key that isn't supposed to have a key.”
Goyeneche said there's a bigger problem with the facility: no cameras in the areas where sensitive evidence is held or accessed.
“That's one issue that I think obviously needs to be discussed and addressed from a security standpoint,” Goyeneche said.
“You want everything camera'd as much as you can and it's a funding issue. We've gotta find the money to do all these different things,” Serpas said.
Remember, this latest discovery comes at the same time that the FBI continues its investigation into the last round of missing money here at central evidence and property.
Starting in 2007, police uncovered hundreds of thousands of dollars in missing money from trailers that were housing it post-Katrina. It prompted the feds to look into this case.
“We're still working with the FBI on the original investigation from three to four years ago, and that right now is separate and apart from this as far as I know,” Serpas said.
So far the public integrity bureau is handling the investigation into this latest round of missing money.
