Civilians Replacing Cops? C.S.I.s Frank Carson & Bill Greene & The Future of Law Enforcement

With historical shortages in law enforcement, today's departments have to find ways of augmenting positions that were traditionally filled by sworn law enforcement officers. One option is to have civilians working these jobs. On today’s show, we will be highlighting the trend in crime scene investigations being civilianized. Some departments have embraced this a long time ago, having 100% civilians in this role, have a blend of civilian and sworn, or have dug in their heels and refuse to have civilian Crime Scene Investigators.  

On the show today, I have two Crime Scene Investigators from the Prince George’s County Police Department. 

William “Bill” Greene, who was hired as one of the first civilian C.S.I.s 42 years ago, and Frank Carson, who served as a sworn law enforcement officer with distinction for 35 years, and after retirement, went back to his department as a civilian C.S.I. 

Bill and Frank both have incredible pedigrees that would take up most of the hour we have for the show. Frank has worked as a detective, a fatal crash investigator, a C.S.I., and other valuable roles with his department. 

Bill has a very long list of impressive credentials and 42 years of investigating just about every type of crime imaginable. 

Please enjoy this conversation with two pros as we map out the future of law enforcement.

In today’s episode, we discuss:

·      Frank rejoins the ranks of the police department as a civilian C.S.I. after a long and distinguished career as a sworn officer. 

• Bill being one of the first civilian C.S.I.’s for the department.

·      35mm cameras were used in police work before digital cameras.

·      The role of C.S.I. at a major crime scene in different departments.

·      Bill working on the case of the nurse who was suspected of killing at least ten of her patients before being arrested for murder.

·      Bill working the Len Bias death case.

·      The book, Never Suck a Dead Man's Hand by Dana Kollmann.

·      The future of civilians working in law enforcement.

All of this and more on today’s episode of the Cops and Writers podcast.

Head on over to my website to learn more about me and my books!

Check out my newest book! Police Stories: The Rookie Years - True Crime, Chaos & Life as a Big City Cop!

What's the craziest thing you saw when you were a cop?

My first week on the job, a guy running at me with a butcher knife. He'd just killed his brother over the last hot dog.

That's chapter 1. There are 33 more.

Police Stories: The Rookie Years just launched - available on Amazon. 

Search 'Police Stories Patrick O'Donnell' or click th

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

These young men and women, they knew what they were signing up for. Okay, when they came in here. They knew that this was sometimes going to be dangerous.

SPEAKER_00 0:17

Welcome to the Cops and Riders Podcast. Your host, Sergeant Patrick O'Donnell, worked the streets in one of the nation's largest police departments for over 25 years. Ride along with O'Donnell and his expert guests as they help you navigate the oftentimes confusing and misunderstood world of law enforcement. O'Donnell and his guests on this show do not represent any law enforcement agency. The content of this show is not meant to be legal advice. You think you need a lawyer?

SPEAKER_04 0:45

Hey Cops and Writers, thanks for being here with us today for another episode of the Cops and Writers Podcast. I'm Patrick O'Donnell and I'll be your host for today's show. This show is listener-supported, so thanks to all of you who keep the show going. I would especially like to thank those of you who are patrons of the show. Your generosity helps pay for the software, equipment, and my time producing this show. Yes, you too can become a patron for less than a cup of coffee or a pint of Guinness. Just go over on to patreon.com forward slash cops and writers. With historical shortages in law enforcement today, departments have to find ways of augmenting positions that were traditionally done by sworn law enforcement officers. One option is to have civilians working these jobs. On today's show, we will be highlighting the trend in crime scene investigations being civilianized. Some departments have embraced this a long time ago, having 100% civilians in this role, have a blend of civilians and sworn, or have dug their heels in and refused to have civilian crime scene investigators. On the show today, I have two crime scene investigators for the Prince George's County Police Department. William Bill Green, who was who was hired as one of the first civilian CSIs 42 years ago, and Frank Carson, who served as a sworn law enforcement officer with distinction for 35 years, and after retirement, went back to his department as a civilian CSI. Bill and Frank both have incredible pedigrees that would take up most of the hour we have for the show. Frank has worked as a detective, fatal crash investigator, CSI, and other valuable roles with his department. Bill has a very long list of impressive credentials and 42 years of investigating just about every type of crime imaginable. Please enjoy this conversation with two pros as we map out the future of law enforcement. Frank Carson and Bill Green, welcome back to the show. Thank you. Thank you. Well, Bill's never been on the show, but Frank is a returning champion. You were on way back. Episode 11. Is that what it was? Episode 11. Yep. I know I knew it was like in the top 20, the first 20 that I ever did. Yep. And I what is it? Crashing into traffic investigations with Frank. Something like that. Yeah. Yeah, that's that's what I did because I was always fascinated with crash investigations. You know, I spent my time on the street, you know, as a copper and then as a boss, and I always loved, loved, loved seeing you guys come up to the scene as like, huh?

unknown 3:28

Okay.

SPEAKER_04 3:28

And we love doing it. And I and my cops hated doing it. So and as a cop, I absolutely hated doing it. So for us, it was the motorcycle cops that did the uh crashes. That's how they more or less segued into being a traffic investigator. Is is that the way it was with you guys?

SPEAKER_03 3:48

No, we we have motormen, but the motormen do their motors thing, and we have a separate uh collision analysis and reconstruction unit that that is uh I'm obviously not with them. Yeah, um, but uh handle fatal crashes, critical injury crashes, and do traffic enforcement DUI and things like that. But couple of our motormen have been through like level one or two reconstruction class, but they no, they don't handle uh they don't handle traffic crashes, which is apparently I I'm finding is in some ways kind of unusual in the law enforcement community.

SPEAKER_04 4:21

It is, you know. I interviewed Jerry Palladino, he is down in Florida, he's uh he's the motorman. Right. You you you're familiar with him?

SPEAKER_03 4:31

Oh, I've looked I've heard all your podcasts.

SPEAKER_04 4:33

No, okay. Yeah, Jerry has a huge YouTube following. He he sells courses, he has motorcycle instruction um courses for beginning, advanced, you know, all all levels of motorcycle riders. I'm a motorcycle guy, so I I love watching his YouTube videos. And I interviewed him, and he's like, Yeah, we we don't do crashes. And I'm like, a motorcycle cop that doesn't do he says no Florida State State Patrol does all the crashes. I said, even like in the city, and he's like, Yeah, they just come and take it. And I'm like, so you get to ride around on a motorcycle, have the cool boots, and you're not taking accidents, you're just pulling over speeders and doing you know, traffic enforcement. And I'm like, My jaw dropped because that's the main reason why I did not become a bikeman was I don't want to be scratching out accidents all day long. It's like nope, no, thank you. So let's start with you, Frank. Let's let's start with your career. And can you say where you work right now, or is that okay?

SPEAKER_03 5:44

Yeah, yeah. Okay, go ahead. I work with I currently work with uh as a civilian crime scene investigator with the Prince George's County Police Department, which is outside of Washington, DC. Uh I started that career. Well, prior to that, I uh had numerous jobs like you do when you're younger. Um I I rode uh work with a basic ambulance unit, worked with a medic unit. I worked in a what I call a basic emergency room uh type situation as an emergency room technician, worked with patients, and I also worked in a trauma center, worked with patients as a trauma technician. 1988 I went in the police academy, spent 35 years there, retired in the beginning of 2023 as a sworn officer. Uh, of course, was in patrol. I did uh um stint as a district evidence technician for our investigators. I was a detective for a while. I went to uh our informational service doing computers and all that kind of stuff. And uh in 1998, I went in the Reconstruction Unit and uh stayed there for 25 years and there. I taught and uh put together classes, uh specialty classes. I testified in court and qualified as a witness 21 as an expert witness 21 times in court. I uh retired from there, and uh, there's a job opening as a crime scene investigator, and as I tell people they uh 45 days after I retired, they foolishly hired me back because this is early. I've I've been doing that ever since.

SPEAKER_04 7:19

So the big question, Frank, is when are you gonna retire, retire?

SPEAKER_03 7:25

Yeah um I you know I I've got friends who say if you if you stop moving, you die. So uh no, I'm gonna be uh I'll I'll I'll put it to you this way. I will do there will there will probably become a day, and my FTO told me there will come a day in your police career where you will say you will wake up one morning and say, I'm done. And one morning, Buffy, I will wake up and say, I'm done. And and and that'll be it. So when that day is, I don't know.

SPEAKER_04 7:56

Uh we'll see. Well, it's quite handy to have that ace in your pocket. You know, that's you know, all the guys that I worked with that had 25 years plus, I'm like, when are you gonna pull the pin? And when I feel like it.

SPEAKER_03 8:10

Well, I I will I will put a time limit on it. Civilian retirement is 30 years. I'm not gonna be 93 years old doing this job.

SPEAKER_04 8:19

If if you are Frank, we're gonna come and you're gonna put you're gonna we're gonna put you in a rubber room and yeah, we're gonna have a long, long talk if you're absolutely absolutely there's more to life than that. Yeah, but let's go over to Bill here. Now, Bill, you began your career at the Prince George uh County Police Department as a crime scene investigator in 1982. Yes, are you still doing this?

SPEAKER_01 8:45

Well, I got hired by the county in 81. So April 20th, I'll have 45 years total with the county. But I got hired by the police department as a crime scene investigator. Back then it was called evidence technician. Uh, but the TV shows renamed all of us crime scene investigators a few years ago, obviously. Um the interesting thing was I actually was applying all over the state of Maryland and even out of the state of Maryland to be a police officer. Yeah. Well, I got I applied to Prince George's County because my brother-in-law was here and I grew up in the county, and I said, Well, I want to serve the community like my brother-in-law was doing, and I applied took all the testing and so forth, but the academy class was full, and then the following academy class um was canceled, and coincidentally, they had this position of evidence technician, crime scene investigator, and they the recruiter looked at my resume and said, you know, you would be really good. We we have another position called uh evidence technician that you would be great in. And it was a civilian position. I went, well, maybe I'll do this until the academy starts or something like that. And I uh I looked at it and I had started and I fell in love with. I I really did. I just I worked with and still work with some of the most amazing men and women you know that I have ever met in my life. I was just speaking to one of the uh uh gentlemen who was here when I started um this morning, and we were talking about careers and so forth. And I said, you know what? I said, I remember my very first day that I came in, I really didn't know what to expect, but I remember that we were cooking filet mignon on the front porch and eating corn on the cob. And I remember thinking, this is the greatest job in the world, and they're gonna pay me for this. And that was the beginning. Then in uh 2021, I got promoted to supervisor. Um, I was a crime scene investigator on a Friday, and then on Monday came back in and suddenly I was in charge of a squad. That was eye-opening. Um and then in 2014, I was promoted to manager of the crime scene investigation investigation division, which is comprised of the evidence unit, computer forensics, and video analysis. People ask me all the time, like as you did, you know, when are you gonna retire? And I've thought about it, but I can honestly say I am one of these people that's truly been blessed that there has not been a day in my career that I have not enjoyed coming to work and working with these you know civilian investigators and the police officers and detectives. I have I still learn from them today after 45 years. Wow.

SPEAKER_04 12:33

Now, Prince George's County Police Department, that's not a sheriff's department?

SPEAKER_01 12:39

No, we have a sheriff's department, but it's separate from the police department. Oh wow. And we, as Frank said, we're right outside of Washington, D.C. We sit between Washington, D.C. and Baltimore City. Okay. Um, you know, for reference. We have Frank, how help me out here. How many sworn officers do we have?

SPEAKER_03 13:03

Yeah, it depends on who you talk to. Um it's gonna be somewhere, and someone I'm sure will jump in and correct me at some point. I want to say 1200, 1100, something like that. But I haven't, I haven't, I haven't kept up on it since I retired, really.

SPEAKER_04 13:22

Okay, so about 1200. Now, has the CSI stuff has that always been civilian in that department?

SPEAKER_01 13:32

No, um, that's what's interesting. I was a second civilian hired, and a lot of police agencies are going to civilians now.

SPEAKER_04 13:42

They are, yes.

SPEAKER_01 13:43

They they are able to hire young men and women fresh out of college with a degree in forensic science. And one of the things that's important to point out is some people want to come into forensics with a degree in criminal justice. Well, criminal justice and forensic science are truly apples and oranges. If you have a degree in criminal justice, you want to be a police officer. You know, if you want to work in the forensic community, you have to take the hard sciences and you are going to school for forensic science or forensic investigation.

SPEAKER_04 14:27

That's interesting because, like, where I worked in Milwaukee, when I first started, it was all sworn. Yeah, and it was forensic technicians that would go to a crime scene. And we also had a photo car. Yeah. And the the photo car was a guy with a 35 millimeter camera that would just just take pictures, they wouldn't collect evidence, they wouldn't dust for prints, they wouldn't try to, you know, well, DNA really wasn't a thing back then, but it was all pictures. And he was the hap-I think he was probably the happiest guy on the department because we had our own photo lab. You know, we we we processed our own photos, and you know, again, for the for the kids out there that just know digital, yeah, we had these things called 35 millimeter cameras that you know there'd be a roll of film in your camera, and there'd be what like maybe 36 or 24 or 12 or 12. That's right.

SPEAKER_01 15:26

Or 12, yeah, or 12.

SPEAKER_04 15:28

Yeah, yeah. Because I remember I was a big uh photography buff when I was in high school and college, and I took you know, like different photo classes when I was in college, and I thought it was so cool that you know you can go in a dark room and develop these you know pictures and all that good stuff, and that's what we had our own darkroom, you know, at the police department, and we did all of our own processing of all this stuff, and yeah, it's just now is just such a totally different world, you know. And we've all seen it evolve, you know, through the years, but again, it was all sworn law enforcement that did the CSI stuff, they're forensic tech technicians, and forever they were talking about well, we're gonna civilianize this, you know. We're low on numbers for cops, obviously everybody is. You know, they're hurting for full duty people, and it's like we should probably hire civilians. They started doing that, and it's funny because a couple months ago I was at like police headquarters getting my new HR 218 um ID, and that's in the photo processing area, you know, the CSI area, you know, blah blah blah. I said, Hey, how's it going with the uh you know switching over? I said, Is there any sworn left? Because they're not gonna like fire them or you know, they threatened to banish them back out of the street, and there was wailing and mashing of teeth, and that did not happen. But what they did find was they didn't want these young kids, you know, fresh out of college, being with these salty old cops, so they put them on opposing shifts, they don't want them even talking to each other, they put them in different rooms because at first they're like, Well, these would be good mentors, they'd be good, you know, people to train these uh people, and they're like, Oh god, their attitudes changed immediately, and all of a sudden it's like, Oh, this this department sucks, you know, blah blah blah blah blah blah blah. They became grouchy and old, and they're like in their mid-20s.

SPEAKER_01 17:29

Yeah, you know, we uh my experience was a little bit different. Um, I came in, I was 23, 24 years old, and I was I was a young kid, you know, and there were nine people in the crime scene unit, two being civilian. Um the rest were all sworn. I am of the opinion, and I know that we're gonna get uh comments on this from directors of other labs saying, oh, it should be all civilian. I have fought to keep sworn and civilian together, okay. I believe that the civilians can learn a lot from the officers, okay? And the officers actually do learn a lot from the civilians who come out of college, you know, with a degree. I like the mix. Now, now we're going to move eventually through attrition to all civilians. Sure.

SPEAKER_04 19:00

And that's what we're doing. Yeah, that's what we're doing.

SPEAKER_01 19:02

But I looking back at my career, I am so thankful that I was trained by sworn officers. I learned a discipline from them. Um they never treated me differently, they never looked down on me like, oh, you're just a civilian. And I can tell you that police agencies that try and separate them almost invariably it's it's a disaster for them because they end up with a lot of in-house fighting. Sure. We don't have that, we don't have sworn versus civilian here, and I attribute that to the fact that we treat everyone the same here, which means everybody gets treated poorly.

SPEAKER_04 19:54

So Frank looks pretty worn down there. Yeah, he looks pretty beat up.

SPEAKER_01 20:00

We we have beat poor Frank up, okay. You know, but I wouldn't change my career in terms of working with the Sworn for anything in the world. I I remember, and there are there are little things, Pat, that the civilians don't think about. And I remember riding with my FTO, uh JT Moore, who I'm still in touch with, who was a phenomenal FTO. And I remember one night we were working evenings, and he had me driving, which was also one of the neatest things to be driving a police car. And yep, we are one of the few agencies that civilians are trained and we can run priority. And I remember he said, Let's go get a cup of coffee at 7-Eleven. It was about 10 o'clock at night. I'm not thinking, what do I do? I pull right up in front of a 7-Eleven and he goes, Stop, what are you doing? And I'm going in to get us a cup of coffee. He goes, Nope. He goes, Back up, pull over here to the side, and we're gonna sit here for two or three minutes and see what's going on inside there, because I don't want to walk in on an armed robbery in progress. And you know what? Those things have stuck with me today. Okay, and it drives my wife crazy if we go to a restaurant. I don't want, I don't want to be sitting with my back towards the door. Absolutely, because I want to see who's coming in. Now that means my wife and I have had that hard conversation of if I ever tell you to get out, don't ask me why. Okay, just do what I'm telling you, okay, type thing. Uh and she she understands that, you know, I think pretty well.

SPEAKER_04 21:57

So, was there any pushback? You know, you said that you you guys got along pretty well. You're only one of two civilians in that you know, department. There wasn't any pushback because you were not a sworn officer.

SPEAKER_01 22:08

No, I I cannot think of one single incident. In fact, maybe a little bit the opposite. Sometimes I think they forgot we were servil we were civilians. Um, I would be riding with my FTO, and he would see a traffic violation. Or a robbery would go out, and the next thing I know, we're running priority, and I'm sitting there scratching my head, going, I wonder if he's forgotten I'm a civilian. So, no, we we never had a problem. I know other agencies have, but I I've really been very fortunate in my career. The the officers have treated the civilians very well. Um, I will tell you though, that there have been times that supervisors have come in now and said, you know, oh well, I'm gonna send this officer to this call because you know it may be a little bit uh dangerous. Okay. And I've had to go to them as a manager and say, don't do that. You can't do that. If you want to separate this office and pit sworn against civilian, start doing that. These these young men and women, they knew what they were signing up for, okay, when they came in here, they knew that this was sometimes going to be dangerous, and you have to use common sense. Okay.

SPEAKER_04 23:44

Um, so and most of the time when you guys would show up, it was well after the fact, you know, that something happened. But you know, but you're also in neighborhoods where stuff can pop off at any moment, you know, that all of a sudden you're like, oh, wait, hey, I didn't expect that, you know. Or hey, look what's happening down the block, or whatever the case may be. Now, I assume are you guys like in the same uniforms? Yes, we are now obviously I'm guessing that they give you vests. Yes, they do. Oh, we're we're we're not in police uniforms, not police uniforms, it's CSI VDUs and a polo shirt. Oh, okay, okay.

SPEAKER_01 24:27

But and it has the county seal on it, okay, and it does and it does say police on it.

SPEAKER_04 24:34

Okay, now you're wearing a vest. Are you armed? No. Do you have that option? Or no?

SPEAKER_01 24:42

No, no. Um, the only police agency that I've found in the country, and I'm sure there's others, that their civilians are armed, is San Diego, and it's an option for them. But they, if they opt to be armed, they have to go through all of the same training uh that the sworn officers do, they have to qualify every year and so forth. I'm sure there's other police agencies, I'm gonna guess in the Midwest and maybe even Texas, yeah. Um, where you when you're born, they hand you a gun. Yeah, I think everybody's got a gun in Texas, everybody's got a gun in Texas, sure, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 25:26

So yeah, yeah, because I have a buddy that was copper in Milwaukee and he moved and he wanted Vegas Metro. Yep, and they went civilian for their CSIs, and he said it was great because you have these young kids coming out of college, and they were excited to actually go to a crime scene, and they just thought it was the neatest thing ever. And he said, you know what? They always got prints in Milwaukee. You know, we had if you saw like Joe or Jane, you're like, they're not gonna find anything because they don't want to find anything, yeah. You know, they're a coat hanger, they're an empty suit, you know. That there's yeah, oh god, way too many of those. And in Vegas Metro, he said, I love these new guys, and on top of that, he said they get vests, and if they want a gun, they could have one, but they like you said, they have to qualify, they have to go through the training. Yeah, so they go home, they tell their wives and their husbands, and it's like, yeah, I you know, I I you're watching CSI and TV, and it's like I'm like in a police car and I'm wearing a vest and I'm wearing a uniform and I got a gun, and I'm doing CSI stuff all day. This is the coolest job ever.

SPEAKER_01 26:43

Yeah, I have I have a concealed carry, and probably three or four of our civilians have concealed carries. I've had mine on and off for a number of years. Um, I'll be honest with you, Pat. I I rarely carry the thing. Now, having said this, and I'll get a lot of flack from people that live in Baltimore. My daughter is a nurse in Baltimore, and when she was going to school there, that was one of the few times that I actually put my gun on. I never felt the need for it um working. Yeah, having said that, uh a few years ago we were working a homicide scene, and the suspects were in the woods, and they fired a shot at the apartment, and the ram went through the apartment where our civilian and sworn CSIs were working.

SPEAKER_04 27:41

Oh boy.

SPEAKER_01 27:41

Yeah, so it it is a dangerous job. It truly is.

SPEAKER_04 27:47

Yeah, it yeah, with with law enforcement, you never know. I mean, there's it it could just happen, you know. But that's that's very common, actually.

SPEAKER_01 27:57

You know, I had a gentleman, I had a gentleman a number of years ago that jumped out of a car with a gun while I was sitting at traffic light. And yeah, that was that was an interesting uh confrontation that we had there, but obviously it ended you know well. Um and it was and you you probably know this feeling, I think any police officer does. The uh greatest sound, you know, that I heard was in the distance, those sirens coming. Oh, absolutely. My to my rescue. And I think I even told the guy, I said, I said, you need to understand that. Do you hear that? That's the cavalry coming. I said, so you keep your hands right here on the car. I said, and there won't be any problems. I said, because if I get hurt, they're gonna be really ticked off at you.

SPEAKER_04 28:53

So let me ask both of you guys this since you know, Frank, you're doing the CSI stuff now. I am fascinated by how different departments handle the same crimes differently than like what I did back in the quote unquote back in the day, and still today, where say you've got a homicide, you know, somebody's shot in front of their house, you got a dead body. You know, the scene isn't like too crazy, you know. You got lots of yellow tape or maybe some red tape up there for an inner and outer perimeter. We started doing that like towards the end of my career. Now, how many CSI people are gonna show up compared to detectives?

SPEAKER_01 29:35

It depends on the day of the week.

SPEAKER_04 29:38

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 29:39

When I first started, Pat if I got a homicide, I handled it myself from start to finish. Okay, that's different now, and it's much better now because we will call out on call people. So we will have people there running the Faro scanner, taking photographs. One of the CSIs will be the primary, and he will kind of oversee uh that forensic investigation. So, how many CSIs?

SPEAKER_03 30:12

That was actually that was a hard Go ahead, Frank. That was a hard thing for me to get used to because coming from Crash, I handled everything search warrants, subpoenas, diagrams, collecting evidence, mix of kid notifications, identifying the person, fingerprinting, autopsy if necessary. So I get the crime scene unit, and then I get to like my first, like I went to a death investigation with an FTO, and I'm looking okay, then this is ID, so I wonder if he still lives there, and he's like, oh, wait a minute. I that's that I that's not my responsibility now. And I go to homicides, like instead of me doing the diagram and everything, if I'm primary, one person's doing the diagram, one's doing the pharaoh, one's doing this, one's doing that. And I'm like, kind of like, um, I feel like I'm not doing as much as I should. But that was hard to get used to.

SPEAKER_01 31:04

See, like for us, you are Frank, I can tell you, just say you know, you're doing enough.

SPEAKER_04 31:09

He's an overachiever, he's an overachiever. He's an overachiever. Yes. So, like, say, you know, I just talked about that homicide. What would happen is obviously the cops would get there first, and a sergeant. Sergeant would call for resources, and our homicide unit would show up, and the CSI people would show up. Now, what would happen is the homicide, either a sergeant or a lieutenant from the homicide unit is gonna show up with a small army of detectives. They are gonna be the ones that are going to process the scene as far as they're gonna do the diagram. And I'm talking about the wheel thing, you know, measuring from you know the guy's head or crotch, you know, to like say the fire hydrant or something fixed. Yeah, you know, doing the crime scene diagram, you have one guy, and then you're gonna have another detective that's going to work in concert with the CSI person that once you know they take the photos, you know, like say there's a gun on the front steps. Okay, obviously you're gonna want a a ton of pictures of you know from every angle you can think of of the entire scene, then you kind of like shrink it down a little bit. Then now you're taking you know very specific pictures of you know, like any casings or the the weapon itself, you know, etc. etc. And they work in concert, and then once all the photos are done and all that, most of the time that homicide detective is gonna take the gun, not the CSI person. And then they'll take it like to the lab or whatever if it has to get fumed or whatever the case may be. And I talked to other departments, you know, other people in departments where it's like there's a small army of CSI people and one or two detectives, and that's it. The detectives will do a walkthrough of the scene, and then it's like, okay, you need to be out of the scene, you know. So the detectives are actually looking for witnesses, interviewing witnesses, trying to develop leads on a suspect and following up on that lead, while the scene itself is the CSI's baby. That's their that's their world. Like, you know, I think of like say the UK. You know, I've interviewed detectives from like say in England or Ireland, and you know, they're all putting on the kydex, you know, outfits with the booties, and I mean that they go way, way over the top, and the cops can't even come near this that scene. They and the their detectives might do a walkthrough. Sometimes they don't even do that. They're like, this is our scene. You know, you go you do your detective stuff, we're gonna do the CSI stuff. What is it like with you guys?

SPEAKER_01 33:54

Well, I I think Pat, one of the things that keeps running through my mind, I think we have to talk about what our responsibilities are. Okay. Um, we don't handle breaking and enterings or theft from autos like a lot of crime scene units. We are primarily responsible for, and Frank, if I miss one, let me know. We go to homicide, death investigation, suicide, rape, storefront arm robberies, physical and sexual child abuse. And did I miss any, Frank?

SPEAKER_03 34:35

Uh, those are the big ones. I mean, we get a call for occasional, you know, we you know, like we found a piece of evidence, come and get it, uh, type thing. But and we we process uh uh carjack vehicles and the homicide vehicles.

SPEAKER_04 34:49

Yeah, I would assume you do arsons too.

SPEAKER_01 34:52

No, you don't do all we assist we assist the fire investigators with any arson cases that result in a death. Okay, if it doesn't result in a death, we don't we don't have anything to do.

SPEAKER_04 35:10

So if you're not going to those you know the other crimes, who does that? The regular street cops?

SPEAKER_01 35:17

No, no, the well, in that case, the fire investigator does all the forensic evidence there. The uh street officer would handle the uh breaking and entering, theft from autos, things such as that. I think it's important to point out though, we have a good relationship with all of our detectives, and we really work hand in hand with them. One of the things though that I will say that I've watched over the years is uh with hiring uh these young men and women um with degrees in forensic science, is they come in here and they can hit the ground running. They they have an understanding and a grasp of the crime scene that uh probably 30 years ago we didn't have because you're gonna remember back in the 80s there were no forensic programs in any colleges, right? It was criminal justice, yep, and it's only been in the last 15, maybe 20 years that we've seen just about every college um has a forensic science program. Now, having said that, I think um I need to say for the young men and women who are looking for a career in this, not all colleges and that offer forensic science are created equal.

SPEAKER_04 36:51

Sure.

SPEAKER_01 36:52

Okay, they're they're just simply not, and we see that when we do interviews. Um, I'm gonna give a uh shout out here to WVU West Virginia. They have one of the best, and there are others, okay, but we hire a lot of young men and women from WVU, their forensic science program there is phenomenal. Um so I think that if somebody is looking for a career in this, look for a college that is truly recognized for their forensic science programs. Gotcha.

SPEAKER_04 37:32

Now to circle back, so say I do have that homicide, how many detectives to CSI people, what would the ratio be?

SPEAKER_01 37:40

They come out as a squad, and oftentimes they there can be as many as five uh homicide detectives, but they're busy doing things, interviewing witnesses, doing neighbor neighborhood canvases. Um, and they really, uh, and Frank tell me if I'm wrong, they really uh trust us to uh handle the scene, you know, appropriately. Yeah, we do we do recover uh the handguns, we recover the drugs, we recover the money. Um the detective really doesn't recover anything, we recover it all.

SPEAKER_04 38:27

So you document everything, yeah. Obviously, you know, photos first, you know, you're gonna have a zillion photos. And do you guys take video?

SPEAKER_01 38:38

We don't, and I have a funny story about that. I have pushed away from doing video because we and other agencies have had minor horror stories about doing video if you don't mute the audio. Oh, oh boy, this is because cops are gonna be cops. Okay, I got cops or cops, okay. And I remember doing it one time, and this detective decided to lay out his theory of what happened, and it ended up all on video. Oh boy, and unfortunately, it was all wrong. So I tell people if your agency is going to make you shoot video of a crime scene, there's a way to do it, okay? But mute the audio because you do not want people's opinions coming across that way.

SPEAKER_04 39:45

That and whatever else that's just not appropriate for that point in time.

SPEAKER_01 39:50

Exactly.

SPEAKER_04 39:50

Oh gosh, yeah, I could I could totally see that. Now, I had a question for you, Frank. This is a little bit different, but it was your crash years. You know, in the city of Milwaukee, we got a new chief from Out East that thought we were a bunch of bumpkins and you know, we just didn't know what we were doing, and he was so super enlightened, and you know, he was he was the smartest guy in the room. All you have to do is ask him. But he he bowed to political pressures for regarding police chases, high-speed chases. Okay, and one of the byproducts that we had from that was fatal car accidents went up 400% in one year. Because all of a sudden it's like, well, if the police aren't gonna stop us, why should we stop for that stop sign? Why should we stop for that red light? Why should we, you know, it now it's a free-for-all, it turned into the wild west, which kind of matches your hat, really, Frank. I mean, it's kind of wild west-ish. But but it looks mighty good on you, I must say. I must say you you wear it well, my friend. But did you guys ever like encounter something like that where you restricted, you know, you hit you brought in this policy, and all of a sudden you'd restrict something like that, and then there's a byproduct that you just didn't see coming?

SPEAKER_03 41:14

Uh we we when we did our yeah, we modified our chase policy like in 91 or 92, not as restricted as it is now, but we modified it back then. But when they went to the except for certain exceptions, um certain crimes to a no chase policy, we did not see in the years I was there an increase in fatal crashes as a result of that. Um, our setting is a little different from yours. Milwaukee is of course a city. Um, we have a lot of open area too, and I could go into you know primary causes of our fatal crashes. But the short answer to your question is we didn't see a spike in fatal crashes when we changed our uh Chase policy.

SPEAKER_04 41:56

Interesting. But we did like a complete drastic change. It wasn't like an ease, like you know, you said like in 91 you changed your uh policy, and then later on you kind of tighten that up a bit, I'm guessing.

SPEAKER_03 42:11

Yeah, it's um I've been out of it obviously for a couple years, but my understanding is now is uh you cannot chase, uh you can chase for crimes involving uh threat of violence or violence, uh homicide suspects, carjacking suspects, rape suspects, armed robbery suspects. That is up to the road supervisor who can call it off. Um but the uh traffic only is not allowed, stolen vehicle is not allowed, just regular theft is not allowed, uh things like that. And a supervisor is required to monitor the radio traffic and uh and keep an eye on that. Now it's Prince George's County. Um we have other jurisdictions uh you know within Prince George's County have different policies. However, our county council recently passed a law that essentially said municipalities um in Prince George's County have to follow the same Chase policy as the Prince George's County Police Department does. Wow.

SPEAKER_04 43:09

Okay, okay.

SPEAKER_03 43:11

Yeah, that brought a little uniformity to it. Um whether you agree with it or not, that brought some uniformity to it.

SPEAKER_04 43:17

Right, right, which there should be, I think. You know, you should all be playing in the same sandbox, you know. If it just that makes sense to me, but and I don't want to make the whole show about you know police chases, but there was a lot of unintended consequences that were negative from doing this, where you had literally little old ladies going to church on Sunday that were getting killed because you had some asshole that just didn't want to stop for that light or that stop sign, or you know, they're going 40 miles over the limit, and they knew there's nothing we could do. And the cars that they're driving are either stolen or don't have plates. I mean, there's no way of tracing you know that back to the person, you know. So it's like you know, yeah, it's like our city is debating right now about putting in uh stop sign and red light cameras in the city. And my biggest complaint with that, and a lot of other people too, is your biggest offenders are the criminals who are driving around in stolen cars, they don't have plates, or they put you know, they steal a plate and they put it on their car or whatever, right? And they're gonna rack up how many different You know, like stop sign or red light violations, then this poor person who got their car stolen, they're responsible for it, and they have to jump through mega hoops to get it because we would have stolen cars, and just like parking tickets, they're like, Hey, I got this notice in the mail saying that my registration is now um suspended or revoked or whatever, and it was stolen. And they're like, Well, you need a copy of the you know stolen vehicle report, and blah blah blah. And I had people coming back and said, I did that, and they still won't do it. And I'm like, I'm sorry, there's there's not a whole lot we could do for you, but yeah, there's again unintended consequences happen from some of these things.

SPEAKER_03 45:11

Sure, understood, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 45:12

So that part sucks, but anyways, let's get back to CSI fun stuff. Um, Bill, you had a pretty cool case. I was looking at your um resume here, your bio, and one that jumped out at me is 1986. Prince George's hospital nurse who is charged with killing more than 10 nurses. Tell me about that. That's awesome.

SPEAKER_01 45:34

That that was an interesting case. Um, I got involved because well, let me back up. Um, one Saturday morning, uh, three nurses came to our uh homicide unit. It was early in the morning, and they said, We need to talk to a homicide detective. We think one of our nurses is killing her patients. Oh man. And so obviously, all the bells and whistles you know went off, and you know, they started interviewing them, and come to find out this nurse had I I'll I hesitate to say because I'll get the number wrong and I want to be accurate, but the national average she far exceeded the national average of uh patient deaths, you know, when in her care. And as it turns out, she was injecting them with potassium. Well, what potassium does is it basically throws them into respiratory arrest. Um and so the last one that got everyone's attention was a young man who was 27 years old. He was scheduled to be released in a couple of days. He was there was no reason for him to die, and he did, and it really pushed these nurses to come forward, and I just think to this day how brave they were um to do so. We ended up doing, and uh I ended up doing the exclamations of three of the uh victims, okay, uh patients that had passed away, and we did tox, but the problem that we ran into was uh potassium chloride is naturally found in the body, right? And it's one of the few chemicals that dissipates in the body over time. So when we exhume these bodies and we did tox, all the levels were seem normal.

SPEAKER_04 48:04

Okay, so I'm she ended up being I'm gonna stop you now. You know, I would see a big hurdle is for if you're exhuming bodies, obviously, time uh uh the environment, you know, decay, you know, all that good stuff. But also the bodies are embalmed, right? Yes, absolutely. So you're getting what vitriol fluid from the eye, or were you uh getting the fluid to get this stuff from the liver? Oh okay.

SPEAKER_01 48:34

We were getting it from the liver, uh, from heart. Um, the embalming process is pretty thorough.

SPEAKER_03 48:45

Tell them how you know the embalming process is thorough.

SPEAKER_01 48:48

Prior to my career with the police department, I was a funeral director. Oh, and it's a school for mortuary sciences. Bingo, yeah. So that was the reason they kind of came to me and said, Hey, Mr. Uh ex funeral director, we have to go and do these exhumations, tag you're it, okay. So boy, what a fun job that was. Oh yeah. So I it was my job with the medical examiner to go ahead and you know get these uh these samples, and so we did, but it really proved nothing. The state's attorney's office at the time decided to charge her anyway and move forward, but she was acquitted um of all charges. She did lose her nursing license, um, and it's one of those cases that I think back, you know, with technology today. Is there anything we maybe could have done differently? Okay, what else could we have done? And when I sit there and I really think about it, that's another one of those cases where some people just get away with murder. Yeah, and I think that was the case there.

SPEAKER_04 50:15

But 10 murders? I mean, that that's a whole lot, man.

SPEAKER_01 50:19

And that's a conservative number, right? Who knows?

SPEAKER_04 50:22

You know, uh exactly because she had worked at other hospitals. Oh how oh boy, how long was this person a nurse for until this came up?

SPEAKER_01 50:32

I want to say five years, if my memory serves me.

SPEAKER_04 50:35

You could do a whole lot of killing in five years. Yeah, you can. Was she working with Dr. Kavorkian or was her name Kavorkian?

SPEAKER_01 50:42

No, but actually, we called him uh Dr. Boyd, um, who had his own uh TV show, uh, very well-known pathologist. We actually called him in, and that's who we were working with.

SPEAKER_04 51:01

Now, when you were uh exhuming these bodies, did you literally have to take them out of the caskets, go to like an autopsy suite, yes, and do the whole shooting match?

SPEAKER_01 51:11

You couldn't just like do a liver panel or something, or yeah, oh wait, oh they did an entire autopsy on the body because since it was now being ruled a homicide, and most of these people, the doctors had simply written it off. But now that it's a uh a homicide investigation in the state of Maryland, it's a law that if you're conducting a homicide investigation, you must do a full autopsy. No, and so everybody, all three bodies, were fully autopsied.

SPEAKER_04 51:46

Now, correct me if I'm wrong, you know, the casket goes into like a sarcophagus, it goes into a vault, yeah, and it becomes, you know, you get your uh in the afterlife, you have your own jacuzzi more or less, because it just fills up with water, right?

SPEAKER_01 52:05

You know what? That really depends on where they're buried. It also depends on what kind of outer container vault that they're put in. If the state requires at most cemeteries that you're buried in a concrete receptor, right? Okay, but you can purchase a vault, and the vaults are supposedly they're airtight. I've seen other bodies that have been exhumed before, and they they look good, and there is not the um the fluids that you were speaking of. Right. Um these I I of the two, two were in pretty decent shape because they were less than a year um old in terms of being buried.

SPEAKER_00 52:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 52:59

Um I don't think any of them have been buried for much more than a year, if I remember correctly.

SPEAKER_04 53:05

Wow. Now what would this nurse's uh motive be for killing these patients?

SPEAKER_01 53:12

It was a mercy killings, or it was no, I wish I you know what I almost wish it were, but there are there's a term for it, and Frank jump in uh here anytime, but firefighters, for example, okay. We've had firefighters over the years, you know, in in this country who have set fire. Yeah, absolutely. And they are they get excited over the fire. Okay, okay. This nurse, we truly believe that she got excited over the code. It becomes almost an adrenaline rush. And we think that's that was her motive for this, was you know, and sometimes, you know, she would inject these people uh with the potassium, and they were able to bring them back, but she was the one that was working to bring them back, so she was you know considered a hero in some of these uh instances. So she thrived on the adrenaline brush of the code itself.

SPEAKER_04 54:31

She could always take up skydiving or you know, do something like that.

SPEAKER_01 54:35

You don't have to kill people, geez. We we wish she had. Yeah, wow.

SPEAKER_04 54:41

You know what she's doing like today?

SPEAKER_01 54:43

You know, uh that is such a good question, Pat. And I I'm almost a little embarrassed to say that a few years ago I did Google her and to try and see if she was still out there nursing that I couldn't find anything.

SPEAKER_04 55:01

Yeah, her name was Jane Jane Bolding. I would think that she'd probably change her name. I would think so too. Because that's gonna follow you around. Holy cow.

SPEAKER_01 55:10

I I hope so. Yeah, but but but Pat, we have to keep in mind, you know, because she did get a jury trial, she was acquitted. Okay, so oh gosh, it's it's hard to say, but in her defense, she was acquitted. So I don't want to put out there that you know um she did this, she was acquitted by a jury over peers, and we have to respect that.

SPEAKER_04 55:42

Well, yeah, the burden of proof is on the prosecution, yes. So that's even though we know you know this person has done X, Y, or Z, you know, the burden is there. Yes, that's that's the way it's gotta be. And I I'm okay with that. I'm okay with that.

SPEAKER_01 55:57

Statistically, the odds were that she had probably a reasonable person would say, yes, yes, yes, but the burden of proof had not been met.

SPEAKER_04 56:10

Yeah, and then one more, and we'll wrap this up: the death investigation of Len Bias. That okay, I saw that, and I'm like, ooh, there's a blast from the past. Yes, yes, what part did you have in that?

SPEAKER_01 56:22

Um, I was working midnights that night, and you know Len Bias, as many of us may remember, was a star basketball player at the University of Maryland. Um, that case was handled by a very, very competent uh homicide detective by the name Mickey Farretor, um, one of my favorite homicide detectives. And he and I were working midnights, and they communications called and they were all excited, said Limbias has just been taken to the hospital and he's been pronounced dead. Well, I think everybody in the office knew who Limbias was except for me, Pat. Okay. And they're like, you don't know who I'm like, okay, now I do. So I attended the autopsy. I went up to, I believe it was Leland Hospital at the time, and photographed uh his body. And um, I remember specifically going to the autopsy the following day, and there was a lot of discussion about well, oh my goodness, this is such a tragedy. This is the first time that he had ever ingested cocaine. Well, the autopsy report suggested something completely different. Um, unfortunately, he had done it in the past.

SPEAKER_04 57:51

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 57:52

You know, so you know, that was a tragedy. They ended up interviewing the entire basketball uh team, the uh young man who had brought the drugs into the dorm room. Um, I don't think he ever recovered from it, at least in terms of being able to live a normal life.

SPEAKER_04 58:17

Well, they charged him, right? They charged him. They charged him. They did charge him. Yeah, we called the Len Bias um laws.

SPEAKER_01 58:23

Yeah. The the other interesting thing that occurred afterwards was, you know, this was at the heart of this, Pat, this was an overdose. Okay, and we have a lot of overdoses, and well, we had a lot of overdoses back then in the county, and unfortunately, we have our fair share still today. Uh but I recall answering the phone um over in homicide a few twice, and the family of other victims of overdoses uh were asking, look, you guys have put all these resources into this death investigation, you know, to find out who gave Len Bias the drugs. Why is no one looking at who sold my son or my daughter the drugs? And it was a fair question. Yeah, it was a fair question. Um it was political. Oh, at the time, it was very, very political. And it was something I was uncomfortable with at the at the time, and I still am today. Uh you know, I'm that's a case that I'm still uncomfortable with a little bit of how it was handled at the higher levels, sure.

SPEAKER_04 59:48

Yeah, and whenever you know the higher level starts dipping their toes into your pool, you know, it just doesn't end well. Yeah, it's like you you heard the you know the saying staying in your lane. And as a boss, it's like if I had a fatal accident and Frank is gonna roll up, I am gonna be the last person to tell him what to do. It's like, okay, you've done this a hundred times before, and you know what you're doing, you're an expert. Why would I all of a sudden put on my expert hat and say, Well, you know, of course, you know, blah blah blah blah blah blah blah. I'm like, no, go do your thing. Would you like some coffee and donuts? I'd be more than happy to have a cop run, you know, it's three o'clock in the morning and it's cold out. Hell yeah, we're gonna treat you like a king, you know. It's like that's for any bosses that are out there listening to it. It's like, again, stay in your lane. Don't be, you know, just because it's high profile, it's still you know, a death investigation. And obviously, you know, politics is politics, it's always gonna rear its pub its ugly head when it's high profile, when somebody gets arrested or dies or whatever. Now all of a sudden, all the armchair quarterbacks are coming out of the woodwork, and it's like, let the real experts do their jobs.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:06

One of the there was a lot of fallout um from that case. I think one of the saddest was the state's attorney, Bud Marshall, had been a state's attorney in Prince George's County for 20 plus years, and he was very well respected, uh, very good state's attorney. Uh, but it cost him the election the following year. Um, and there so there was that was a turning point within Prince George's County um in terms of politics and elections.

SPEAKER_04 1:01:41

Gotcha. Well, I'll tell you what, we've been going at this for almost an hour, and I think I could talk to both of you guys for about eight hours easily, but I'm gonna cut it here. Anything else you guys want to uh add to the conversation before we say goodbye?

SPEAKER_03 1:01:55

Uh the only thing I would add was uh working out as a civilian crime scene investigator is is great. Um I put in Buffy was talking about having sworn people and civilians. I come in having a background as a sworn officer. I know a lot of sworn officer stuff, but I learn a lot from the folks that have been there. Um I went in there, nobody treated me like a rookie, which was very nice. But then I went through the same training program. It's a great program. Big advantage I I I kid people with is I went in there and the the person who's my field training officer, great guy. We go to homicide, and he says, Well, the homicide is such such a place I'll put it in my GPS and I just smugged. You don't have to do that. I I I know exactly where that bring that to the game and they bring their skills that they can teach me, and the sworn, yeah, Buffy. Uh the sworn and civilian uh mix works.

SPEAKER_04 1:03:01

Yeah, you got the street smarts, Frank. You know, where you know a kid coming out of college just doesn't have the only way you get the the street smarts is to actually work, you know, on the streets, you know. So it works. That's a perfect combination.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:14

We were very fortunate to be able to get Frank. Thank you. I recognize that every day. But Pat, I will tell you one thing. We talked earlier about me maybe writing a book, and you have a book behind you, Never Suck a Dead Man's Hand. Yes, written by Dana Coleman. I love Dana, and Frank is the one who turned me on to her. I love Dana, and every time I think about writing a book, I say to myself, I can probably not write a book as good as Dana wrote hers. Because if anybody really wants to know what it's like to be a crime scene investigator, day investigator day to day, read Never Suck a Dead Man's Hand by Dana Coleman. She nails it.

SPEAKER_04 1:04:03

She nailed it. Absolutely. And she was such a fun person to talk to. That she is, she she is such a character. And again, Frank, I have you to thank for that. I never would have never would have heard of her, I never heard of her before, but I'm just like, oh my god, I got done, and I'm just like, thank you, Frank. That's awesome. All right, well, I think I'll end it here. Gentlemen, thank you so much. I really appreciate it. We're definitely gonna have to do this again. Thank you, everyone, for listening to all things CSI and the future of law enforcement with my two distinguished guests, Frank Carson and Bill Green. I really enjoyed my conversation with these guys, and I hope you did as well. Well, that wraps up another episode of the Copswriters Podcast. If you haven't done so yet, you take a minute and rate and review the show on Spotify or Apple Podcasts. If you have already, thank you. As always, thank you for all of your support, and of course, let's be careful out there.